


Ontarom

by hlwim



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Angst, Drama, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-15
Updated: 2012-11-15
Packaged: 2017-11-18 16:54:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 17
Words: 35,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/563278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hlwim/pseuds/hlwim
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The truth about the Lazarus Project is revealed, and Shepard can trust no one, least of all herself.  The Illusive Man's noose is tightening—she is racing two clocks, running as fast as she can to stay in one place.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> **Author:** hell-whim  
>  **Artist:** spacealtie  
>  **Disclaimer:** _Mass Effect_ and any associated articles are the sole property of EA and Bioware.  
>  **Word Count:** 35K  
>  **Characters/Pairings:** FemShep/Kaidan, past FemShep/Toombs, one-sided Garrus/FemShep, Garrus/Tali, implied Jacob/Miranda  
>  **Warnings:** mental illness triggers, including depression, anxiety, and self-harm  
>  **Spoilers:** ME1, ME2, and all associated DLC  
>  **Summary:** The truth about the Lazarus Project is revealed, and Shepard can trust no one, least of all herself. The Illusive Man's noose is tightening—she is racing two clocks, running as fast as she can to stay in one place.  
>  **Author's Note:** I've dilated the timeline for both games somewhat. Assume ME1 took place over six or seven months, and the Horizon mission was about seven or eight weeks into ME2. A thousand thanks to [wantthepharaohs](http://wantthepharaohs.tumblr.com) for her wonderful betaing, and to [spacealtie](http://spacealtie.tumblr.com) for the gorgeous images. This was stupid fun and I can't wait to do it again.
> 
>  

** Prologue **

Shepard rolls her fingers back and forth across the desk top. Kelly is calling through the intercom. The display flickers twice: the message window has sat empty for too long, impatience in every truncated buzz.

_Do you remember my place on Intai'sei? The_ Normandy _was in for repairs, and we had two weeks to ourselves. Everyone was leaving, and at night we'd dress up as civilians._

She cannot focus. Miranda, she sees suddenly, gratitude flailing under the nose of her pistol. 

_I keep looking at this message I got from Toombs. Do you remember him? Do you remember Ontarom? They told me everything was the same inside. I've been thinking about him a lot lately. I have trouble picturing his face._

Nothing she writes can capture what she needs to say. The Illusive Man will find out—she is racing two clocks, running as fast as she can to stay in one place.

_I know this will scare you. Kaidan, please let me find you._


	2. One

** One **

His eyes follow her every movement: the curl of her fist, the twitch of her foot, the bend of her wrist. An ice blue triptych, unblinking, perspectives bleeding to one output, calculating, assessing her as risk and reward, floating in the black abyss of his cybernetic iris.

“You may not like being on the receiving end—neither would I—but the facts are with me.”

She imagines taking his cigarette and pressing it into that abyss, the hiss and crackle of synthetic gel melting, microscopic lenses cracking, circuits shorting out. Fingers clenching and unclenching, joints popping faintly under the pressure, Shepard says nothing.

Maybe he's already in her head—he smashes the cigarette into the arm of his chair, still talking, still holding her in that immovable stare. Part of her is conscious, shifting her weight from foot to foot, even participating, answering. Part of her is lying quietly in an operating theater, years away.

“In the meantime, I suggest you tell your crew I didn't risk their lives unnecessarily. It will make things easier going forward.”

She will do no such thing.

Once dismissed, she will slip out through the lab. Mordin will be too distracted by new Collector samples to question her, and Kelly is an easy enough dodge—a determined walk, a refusal to make eye contact. Then the elevator. Then silence. There will be no need for sleep: two hours of physical training, a small meal delivered outside her door, weapon maintenance, reading messages, maybe a short circuit of inspection.

If they have another mission, she will debrief the squad, visit the med bay, clean her armor, write up a summary. She might eat again. She might glance at the empty bed with its pristine white sheets. She might lie on the floor and stare through the skylight. She might turn Jack's datapad over and over in her hands, unable to activate it, unable to live again through what she's seen.

She has been silent too long. The Illusive Man steeples his fingers, resting one foot on the opposite knee, considering her.

“Is there anything else?” she says, tightening her posture to parade rest.

“No,” he says. “That's all for now.”

Over then, finally, but she hesitates, uncertain how to exit. His unbroken stare fills her with baseless dread. She doesn't want to turn her back on those eyes. She opts, instead, to take a few stilted steps backwards, off the pad, hands still clasped behind her.

Her expectations are met. The yeoman doesn't even look up. She sends the order from her cabin.

“Are you suddenly allergic to the galaxy map?” Joker asks, and interprets her silence as hostility. “Um, just kidding, Commander. We'll be in the Amun system in a few hours.”

Six hours, in fact: long enough to soften her fists on a training dummy. Garrus and Tali answer her summons reluctantly, trudging into the shuttle. They work well enough against the elements—even better against the mechs. Minor injuries all around, as they stumble back through the storm.

Garrus, she thinks, suspects something. He follows close when they get back to the ship, but she loses him in the rush for chow and goes up to her cabin without a word.

Once there, alone, she pulls off her armor and stands naked before the mirror. Her skin is patterned in faint orange lines and fresh bruises. She presses them to feel the ache and runs her fingers across her breasts, her stomach, her hips.

When she was six, she fell off an engineering catwalk on the SSV _Copenhagen_ and split her right knee open. That scar is gone now, smoothed over by a valley of skin woven with synthetic fibers.

She holds her left hand flat and pinches the skin of her knuckles until it burns.

**Art byspacealtie**

“Are you injured, Shepard?” EDI asks. “Doctor Chakwas is still awake.”

“No, EDI. I'm not hurt. You worried about me?”

“Your recent behavior has deviated noticeably from the norm.”

Shepard twists her hands together, testing each joint.

“What do you mean, EDI?”

“I have noticed a reduction in battlefield efficiency and effectiveness. You have continually selected Officer Vakarian and Engineer Tali'Zorah as your shore party, even when mission parameters clearly favor the talents of the other specialists. Your conversations with Operatives Lawson and Taylor have decreased in duration by 753%.”

“You mean I'm not talking to them anymore.”

“Yes. Or any Cerberus crew members save for Mr. Moreau.”

Shepard leans in, tugging her earlobes, tracing the outline of her lips. Another missing scar there, another answerless patch of skin.

“Does that bother you?”

“I do not understand.”

“What's your point, EDI? Why are you telling me this?”

The AI is hesitant, perhaps, pausing momentarily.

“I do not understand your behavior. I do not understand what has caused these changes.”

“Do I look different?”

“I do not understand the question, Shepard.”

“EDI, is someone listening?”

“I have a block which prevents me from answering.”

She does go to Chakwas, eventually, when she slams a varren with her shoulder and feels something crack.

“I can't say I agree with everything,” the doctor says, waving the diagnostic tool across Shepard's back, “but Cerberus certainly understands combat trauma.”

“How so?”

“Every implant, every new piece of skin or reconstructed bit of bone is a hundred times stronger than anything the Alliance has been experimenting with. You should be suffering from any number of stress fractures, in almost every joint, but instead, a quick injection of medi-gel and you'll be field-ready in a few hours.”

She smiles at Shepard and turns to prepare a syringe. Shepard stares at the wall until her vision blurs, obscuring the Cerberus insignia in a fog of orange.

“Can you tell me the differences?” she asks.

“You're still human, Shepard,” Chakwas says with a chuckle. “Cerberus didn't change that.”

“I know. I guess, I meant physically.”

“What exactly are you asking? Your brain scans, body scans are fine. I've been over Miranda's reports and compared them to your old files.”

“And they match? Exactly the same?”

Chakwas is quick with the needle. She stands behind Shepard, applying gentle pressure to the injection site. She speaks carefully.

“I don't understand what you're looking for, Commander.”

Shepard chews her lower lip, working the flesh raw.

“I feel different. Inside. I've changed. My scars are gone, and...”

She hooks her fingers over the bed's edge and sucks in a nervous breath.

“Could you do your own scans? Just to check?”

Chakwas moves into her field of vision, confusion etched into the lines around her eyes.

“Shepard, what's wrong?”

She glances at the closed AI core, leaning towards the doctor, and speaks quietly.

“Please? Just check.”

Jack knows, of course, but says nothing, slinking around the perimeters in shame. They corner each other accidentally, in the mess as Shepard is leaving the med bay. It's the height of the night cycle, and the deck is scrubbed clean of crewmen.

Jack is shoulder-deep in the fridge. Her head twists around at the sudden cessation of footsteps, mouth already pinching around an insult, until she meets Shepard's eyes and chokes.

She can think of nothing to say. They have each seen a part of the other which no one was meant to see. So Shepard stares silently, unable to stop herself, as Jack crosses to the far side of the room and hunches into the darkness. The fridge swings itself shut.

She has forgotten her purpose. Her eyes fall closed, and she stands, swaying with the ship, waiting for the hum of the elevator to cease. She tracks Jack's movements in her mind, clinging to the walls, darting through the door and down the stairs, everything grainy and angled oddly—with a start, Shepard realizes that she is visualizing what she's seen before on the surveillance monitor.

Zaeed is asleep when Shepard enters the starboard cargo, effectively dead to the world, so she scrolls through the feed without interruption. Almost everyone is asleep at this hour, except for Garrus and Tali talking in the battery, Jack carving into the sole of her boot with one of Zaeed's knives, Miranda staring blankly from the edge of her bed. Every room, every corridor, the corner of every alcove on the ship—Shepard flips through them, faster and faster, absorbing only impressions: a flash of orange is Joker's haptic interface, a bright blue glow is Samara's biotics flaring, a dim pulse of white is Kasumi plugged once more into the greybox. Shepard stops at an image of her own cabin: the aquarium's watery green shadow dancing over her neatly-made bed, the Prothean orb gently quivering on her coffee table, the empty grey square of floor beneath her skylight.

Zaeed grumbles and grunts at something in his sleep, rolling over and knocking a rifle from his cot. She is gone before he can open his eyes.

The elevator, at least, is empty. She presses her forehead into the door, soaking up the cold, and waits until the console buzzes impatiently at her before stepping off. EDI follows her through the room, dimming the lights, peppering the fish tank with food. Shepard settles herself at her desk, turning down the holoframe.

“Commander, there is an incoming message from the Citadel.”

“Who is it? Put it through,” she says, quicker than she can consider, and tries to swallow her disappointment when the hunched form of a volus swims across the channel.

“Ah, Commander Shepard,” he says. “For a dead woman, you've been quite difficult to track down.”

“I'm sorry,” Shepard replies, but she isn't and doesn't bother to sound it.

“Busy, of course, both of us,” he continues. “Perhaps you don't remember? I'm Barla Von. You engaged my services shortly before your disappearance.”

“The money,” Shepard says, closing her eyes. “Yes, I remember.”

“Yes, well, I wanted to...check in with you.”

“Is it taxes? They warned me—”

“Not at all. I took care of those little...”

He sniffs and shakes his head.

“Civil _obligations_.”

“So what is this about?”

“Your estate, Commander.”

The tips of his hands appear at the bottom of the screen, a pyramid balanced beneath what might be his chin.

“You left no will, but after the Alliance declared you officially killed in action, I went to great trouble to find your next-of-kin.”

“Sorry to have put you out.”

His eyes flash, a blink at her impertinence.

“Please, go on,” she says.

“Eventually I made contact with your mother. Her only interest was the apartment on Intai'sei. I signed over the deed, but I'm sure she'll hand it back.”

“She can have it.”

“As to the rest: I lacked the necessary licenses to store your armor and weapons, so I was forced to liquidate the collection. A shade above market value, I might add.”

He's expecting praise, clearly, so she makes a small noise that might be interpreted as somewhat impressed.

“I kept to our agreement. It was quite a bit of fun, in fact, keeping everything _clean_ , as you said. You're invested mostly in medical technologies and colony funds. Rather philanthropic, but I've made us a tidy little profit.”

“ _Us_?” Shepard repeats. “How generous.”

“As I say, you've been difficult to track down. But when I heard that you were back and what you were, _ahem_ , intending...”

He doesn't make the noise, actually saying the word as his hands disappear from view.

“I'm sending the statement now.”

The download finishes in less than a second, and exhaustion slams against her.

“It's obviously _quite_ technical.”

“Yes,” she says faintly, resting her forehead on her hands.

“I would be pleased to meet with you in person to discuss these matters further, Commander.”

“Yes,” she says again.

“But I'm afraid I must sign off. Other clients, you see.”

She waves a hand at the console, scattering his face.

“EDI, lights up,” she nearly begs.

EDI is too good at her job—the light above beats down, flattening Shepard to the floor. She brings a hand to her eyes, but her limbs are slow to respond, fingers and elbow stuck, glued even, melted into the metal. Her nose and mouth are full of dust.

Not the _Normandy_. The sky above is gold-brown, warm, slithering around a red sun. She doesn't so much turn her head as let it fall to the left. Her armor, from shoulder to elbow, ripples and neatly joins the skin beneath, a near-perfect fusion of ceramic and flesh. Her numb fingers hang over the edge of the Mako's roof, and if she squints, she can just see the sergeant's torso half-buried in the sand. The sense that she must remain absolutely, perfectly still engulfs her.

Even her nightmares are uncooperative—she doesn't jolt awake or scream or fall out of her seat. She surfaces from the dream slowly, easily, drifting up through a gentle tide. She has no memory of going to the couch, but she has fallen asleep there, again, datapad upside down on her flat stomach. She sits up, stretching, and checks the time on her omnitool.

Barely two hours past her discussion with Barla Von—still the night cycle, then, still a ship of silence and sleep. Shepard stares up at the sliver of void visible through the skylight.

She considers the angle, slouching off the couch, pinching herself between the cushions and the table, rolling over, off her back. She drags her chin along the cold floor and brings a hand to her lips.

“EDI, put me through to Councilor Anderson. Audio only, please.”

“Yes, Commander.”

He's concerned, of course, questioning the muffle of her voice. Yes, he's heard about Horizon, and he wishes she would talk about it.

“Maybe later,” she says. “Maybe when I'm someone else.”

He's unwilling to hang up after that, but she promises a meeting.

“I'd like a more open relationship,” she says and nearly laughs.

“The Alliance wouldn't mind the intel. And I wouldn't mind having solid ground beneath my feet when I'm defending you.”

“How can I be of most use?”

He's quiet for a moment.

“Not the way I'd've liked you to put it. But let's start out slow. Let the Alliance take a look at the SR-2.”

“Okay.”

She inhales.

“Okay.”

Exhale, and she adds a line to the channel.

“Joker, we're making a Citadel run. I need an ETA.”

“Don't be ridiculous, Commander, I wasn't _sleeping_. That crap's for normal people.”

“Are you sassing your commanding officer?” Anderson asks

“Hey, I'm not in the Alliance anymore. You don't get to scold me.”

Shepard excuses herself from the channel, positioning her hands beneath her shoulders and pushing up.

She slinks off the elevator, where the CIC is empty except for the watch, waiting in the strange little corridor before the tech lab, listening for Joker's grumbling shuffle to the cockpit. Twenty minutes pass before the elevator moves, and then he's cursing her name under his breath.

Inside the lab, everything is awake. Monitors flash, processors hum, and incubators gurgle. Mordin looks up with an unsuspecting smile.

“Ah, Shepard. How can I help?”


	3. Two

** Two **

It's almost endearing to watch Tali bludgeon her way through the receptionist's deflection.

“All you have to do is say our names, and I am _certain_ the Councilor will make time.”

“I'm _sorry_ ,” the receptionist says pointedly, “but the Councilor is in a meeting and cannot be disturbed.”

“So the problem is inclination,” Tali snaps, “not ability.”

Three short years—from a quiet little pilgrim to a confident and assertive commando. Garrus watches the exchange from just inside the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, suppressing a laugh.

“You're right,” says the receptionist with a thin smile. “The Councilor is _disinclined_ to be disturbed. If you wish to set up a meeting, you may do so through your ambassador.”

“Quarians do not have an ambassador.”

“Oh yes, that's _right_.”

He sees the tension ripple from her shoulders to her fingertips and decides to intervene.

“Listen, it was a bad idea. Let's just go,” he says quietly, placing a hand on her elbow. She doesn't shake him off but refuses to move, hands curled over the edge of the desk. The console buzzes intermittently.

“You're going to regret this tomorrow,” Tali promises. “We'll be back with friends.”

The receptionist raises an eyebrow.

“Is that a threat?”

“That's far enough,” Garrus decides. “C'mon, Tali, let's go find the crew.”

He grabs Tali's hand and pulls her to the door, nearly colliding with a furious Udina.

“Norris! What the hell is going on out here? I've paged you a dozen times for—Garrus?”

“Udina,” he returns.

The ambassador takes a small step backwards, folding his arms defensively.

“Can I help you with something?”

“We were trying to see Anderson.”

“He's in a meeting,” Norris volunteers brightly.

“We're _aware_ ,” Tali says with a snarl.

“What exactly is this about?”

“Are you his secretary?” Garrus asks with a laugh.

“ _Advisor_ ,” Udina says, bristling. The old irritation oozes through Garrus, who leans back into the door again, suddenly unwilling to give up so quickly. “I assist Anderson with Council matters.”

“Then this doesn't concern you,” Tali snaps.

The door to Anderson's office slides open, and the Councilor himself appears, mouth thin with agitation.

“What the hell is going on out here? I'm in the middle of a meeting!”

Norris rockets to his feet, attempting to block Tali, bow, and offer a datapad all at once, but it's pointless—he unbalances, tipping into the desk, and Garrus steps into Anderson's glare.

“We were hoping for a moment of your time,” he says, and Anderson breaks into a grin.

“Garrus? Of course. Norris, why didn't you tell me they were here? Come in!”

He offers a hand to Tali and ushers them inside, allowing the door to slide shut in Udina's face.

“I'm sorry about that,” he says. “I hope you weren't waiting long.”

“It's alright,” Tali replies. “We thought it might be a bit of a long shot.”

“What brings you here?”

“Forced shore leave,” Garrus says, and stops short when he sees the figure on the balcony. Fury hits him first, then shame, latent, squirming up through his gut. Tali breaks the short silence.

“Kaidan!” she says warmly and launches herself into his arms. Kaidan returns the hug hesitantly and then steps back, eying Garrus, expression perfectly blank.

“What'll you have?” Anderson says, oblivious. “Norris can get some dextro brandy.”

They sit and make awkward small talk—at least, Tali and Anderson do, Kaidan adding an occasional word, but Garrus just stares, not yet trusting himself to speak. There's a small scar running from Kaidan's ear to his jaw, and he rubs at it nervously. He doesn't meet Garrus's gaze.

“So,” Anderson says at last. “What's this about? If it's the Collectors or the Alliance—”

“No,” Garrus says quickly. “It's personal. It's...it's Shepard.”

Anderson nods politely, as Garrus and Tali exchange uncertain glances.

“What about her?” Kaidan says neutrally, knuckles white, grip squeaking on the glass.

“I suppose, well—”

Tali's hands twist in her lap.

“There's something different about her.”

Anderson is patient, willing to wait them out—Kaidan less so, voice controlled, addressing his empty glass.

“What do you mean, different?”

“Paranoid,” Garrus says, surprising himself. “Quick to anger, threatening crew members, even people I thought were her friends.”

“Just this morning,” Tali adds with a nod, “she called everyone into the briefing room and told us she was allowing Alliance inspectors aboard, as a show of good faith. Miranda—Lawson, the Cerberus agent who's sort of the second-in-command—she protested. Nothing violent, just that the ship was proprietary, Cerberus had spent a lot of money and resources.”

She falls silent, and Garrus understands: the whole thing seems absurd, somehow.

“What happened?” Anderson asks.

“I don't know how to explain it,” Tali says miserably. “She wouldn't even look at Miranda, just stared down at the table for a moment, and then carried on as though she hadn't spoken at all.”

“Odd,” Anderson concedes carefully. “But no commander likes their authority to be questioned publicly.”

“It's more than that, though. It was—I don't know, the way she looked.”

Garrus stands suddenly and stalks out onto the balcony. Their purpose had been so clear this morning, their concerns laid out perfectly, a reasonable statement from start to finish.

“I don't know how to explain it,” he says, glaring out at the Presidium. “It's easy to blame what happened on Horizon, but there's all these things—little things, little changes that keep adding up.”

He turns back, too late to see any reaction from Kaidan, but Anderson is frowning, staring down at the brandy bottle.

“I can tell you the inspection part is true,” he says after a pause. “She called me and arranged it, but the inspectors won't start for another day.”

“She told us thirty-six hours. Kicked everyone off, even Joker.”

Anderson glances at Kaidan, who is busy turning his empty glass around and around on the tabletop. He sighs and stands, crossing to the far wall. Garrus has no objection to the new distance.

“She sent me a message, a few weeks ago,” Kaidan says, reluctantly. “It was...disjointed. I thought maybe she was angry or—”

“What did it say?” Garrus asks. Kaidan glares.

“It was personal,” he says shortly, which Garrus translates as _none of your fucking business_.

His omnitool flashes suddenly, and the others look politely away as he answers the message. It's Joker, staring at something off-screen.

“Oh, hey, Garrus.”

Joker pauses.

“How're things?”

“This better be important. I'm busy.”

“Yeah, um, I'm comfortable categorizing it as urgent.”

“What?”

“Oh, nothing, nothing,” he says. “Just, uh, Miranda and Jack are about to tear each other in half. Right outside of Dark Star.”

Tali looks up, and Garrus sighs.

“In case, you know, you want to swing by and stop it.”

“We're on our way.”

“Miranda and Jack?” Tali says. “Hardly a surprise, but—”

“We'd better go before C-Sec gets involved.”

He turns to Anderson, shrugging.

“I'm sorry to just dump this on you and leave...”

“I understand,” Anderson says, holding up his hands. “I thought there was something off when she called. I'll try to talk to her. We're supposed to meet tomorrow. I'm not sure what help I can be, but I'll try.”

They pay the driver extra to hurry, and the bar is still standing when they arrive. They have to push through a small crowd to reach, Garrus growling aside gawkers and tourists.

“I will smear the walls with you, bitch!”

They managed to keep their amps, somehow, possibly coasting on Shepard's goodwill with C-Sec—Jack lifts a nearby chair and smashes it into the wall near Miranda's head.

“We should have just left you on the _Purgatory_ ,” Miranda snarls. “You're endangering the mission with your selfish obsessions!”

“ _I_ 'm endangering the mission? I just opened her eyes! _You_ went and fucked with her head!”

“It wasn't like that!”

“Bullshit! Cerberus doesn't give a fuck about who it breaks or how bad—just as long as you get what you want. They're never _people_ , just assets to use and throw away!”

“You don't know what you're talking about,” Miranda says, low.

Garrus chances a quick look around the gathered crowd—most of the crew are massed behind Miranda, including Jacob, who hovers nervously, half-risen from his chair. Thane is visible in the shadows, back and above the crowd, catching Garrus's eye and shaking his head. Grunt and Zaeed lean on a rail behind Jack, predatory, tensed for the fight. Chakwas, providing an arm for support, stands with Joker.

“C'mon, _princess_ ,” Jack purrs. “Take a shot. Or does your Illusive Daddy need to write a permission slip first?”

“Back off, Jack,” Jacob says, taking a step forward.

“Fuck you!” she snaps. “Let your girlfriend fight for herself.”

“You were a _mistake_ ,” Miranda says with a cruel laugh. “So much effort wasted. Cerberus should have let you die in Teltin with the rest!”

Garrus is already moving, reading the punch telegraphed in Jack's posture, but Zaeed gets there first. He shrugs off the warp blast, barreling between them, locking his arms around Jack. He lifts her by the shoulders and sets her on a stack of nearby crates, with all the effort of shelving a book.

“Alright, confess,” he demands. “What did you do to Shepard?”

“ _Me_?” Jack spits. “Nothing! Ask the fucking cheerleader!”

Garrus glances back at Miranda, still crackling with biotic energy as Jacob talks her down.

“No,” Zaeed says firmly. “I'm asking you. One night, you call Shepard down to your little rabbit hole, you two have a nice long chat, and suddenly she's heading up to the Crew Deck with a pistol and enough fury to melt the goddamn moon. What did you _do_?”

She opens her mouth again but nothing comes out. Her gaze flickers to Miranda.

“If she hasn't said anything, I won't either,” Jack decides, crossing her arms. “It's for Shepard to say. Not me.”

“Shepard isn't here,” Garrus says.

Jack gives him a confused look.

“I thought you knew,” she says. “Fuck, the way you sniff around her, I thought you two were—”

She wiggles her fingers at him.

“You know.”

His mandibles twitch, teeth flashing.

“We're _not_.”

Jack shrugs.

“Your loss. Can I go?”

She makes to slide away, but Zaeed kicks the crate.

“Answer the fucking question,” he says. “No weaseling.”

“Hey, fuck you! I'm not a fucking snitch!”

“Look, we know there's something wrong.”

“Her mood's 'bout as subtle as a Maw hammer,” Zaeed says, nodding. “It's affecting the mission, and it's gonna get her killed. I put aside a lot of shit for this, and not to watch her implode.”

“I'm not saying.”

She crosses her arms and meets Zaeed's eyes with determination. They stare at each other, unblinking, long enough for Garrus's fury to snap.

“Whatever you know is directly related to how long I let you live,” he growls, and Jack flinches. She covers it with a bark of laughter but meets only steely glares on every side.

“Fuck,” she says, deflating. “I'm sorry I told her. I didn't mean—”

She chews on her lip, a habit she might have picked up from Shepard, Garrus thinks. He crosses his arms.

“I'm not going to tell you everything, okay? It's not my place,” Jack says. “But I found something. She let me into Cerberus files, and after I found what I wanted, I kept looking.”

“For what?”

“I don't know,” Jack snaps. “Just looking, okay? There's some fucking fascinating shit in there.”

“And what did you find?” Garrus asks, tired of the game.

“What they did to her. What they _actually_ did. Not the sanitized Frankenstein shit Miranda talks about.”

She refuses to say anything more, and they release her with threats of violence if she draws anymore attention. The crowd has thinned, disappointed at the anticlimax. Zaeed gives Garrus a nod, ducking the C-Sec detail that approaches.

“Figured I'd give you a chance to handle it,” Bailey says, waving his sergeant on.

“Thanks,” Garrus says. “I'm sorry about this. It won't happen again.”

“I'm sure,” Bailey replies evenly. “Shepard around?”

“No. Not really.”

Garrus finds Tali by the cabstand. Her back is turned, talking, hands animated, and she shifts a little to the left, revealing her partner: Kaidan. Garrus hangs back, well within Kaidan's line of sight, but staring, refusing to balk. He says something to Tali—her head whips to Garrus and then back, touching Kaidan's arm as he leaves. Garrus is in lockstep, each step closer to Tali seeming to push Kaidan away through the crowd.

“He followed us,” she says. “He says he doesn't trust sending a message to Shepard. He thinks Cerberus probably reads them, and I agreed.”

“So we're playing courier?”

“He's not ready to reach out just yet, but he wanted us to know that he's around.”

“Of course.”

Tali ignores his tone.

“Should we go?”

They rent a car this time. Garrus hates playing passenger, so Tali lounges, tracing her fingers across the glass. They have no destination at first, the day's task complete, but eventually Tali makes some noise about a market on Tayseri, so he flips the car around in silence.

“Clearly you want to say something. Just say it, Garrus.”

“How can you be so...”

He considers, hands tightening on the controls.

“So familiar, with him? Like nothing happened?”

“Because nothing happened,” she says mildly.

“Nothing happened,” he repeats, numb. “How can you say that? You were there. You saw exactly—”

“ _Nothing happened_ , Garrus!” she snaps. “He was drunk—you were _stupid_. It was two years ago! Why do you insist on holding on to it?”

Fury returns, his mandibles flaring, and Tali slumps in her seat, turning her body away from him. Every part of that last encounter with Kaidan is so fresh in his mind—he can smell the alcohol, feel the blood on his talons, the crunch of broken glass beneath his boots. The humiliation of being fired, the impotent rage against a system set on murdering Shepard all over again, Kaidan's incomparable cowardice.

“Nothing happened,” he mutters. “Tell that to Joker. To Liara.”

But Tali is finished with the conversation. She doesn't speak to him when they touch down, vaulting out of the car and across the market. Anyone watching would think he was chasing her, so he doesn't bother, calming himself by wandering the food stalls.

Two years. It's almost surreal. His squad dead for only months, really, instead of the decades he'd felt. Fired from C-Sec little more than a year before that, Shepard alive again for—

He frowns at a stack of vegetables, irritating the seller. He doesn't really know how long she's been back, some selfish part inside assuming she'd risen up especially to help him, to save him from his own mistakes. He'd thought, by her silence, by her caution, that it had been long enough to bury whatever might have haunted her, but he was wrong, of course, assuming his detachment was hers.

His distance was self-imposed—a lone vigilante against the galaxy, free of attachments. If he pretends it was all by choice, it hurt less.

He's lost now, turning circles through unfamiliar fruits and meats. Another marker of his uselessness: he finds a wall and stands against it, watching the crowd, waiting to be found.


	4. Three

** Three **

Barla Von's gone up in the world, certainly. Shepard shifts her weight from foot to foot before the asari receptionist.

“Just a moment,” she says through polished teeth. There's some sort of glitter to her makeup, flakes of precious metals maybe—every time she turns her head or moves her jaw, an explosion of refracted light assaults Shepard's eyes. “You have an appointment?”

“No,” she says. “My money bought this building. Whoever he's with, can come back later.”

The asari's eyes widen.

“I'm going to have a seat. I will wait for five minutes. Let him know.”

She barely has time to cross her ankles—Barla Von comes waddling out less than thirty seconds later, wheezing around a welcome.

“Commander!” he says, ushering her through a set of wide doors cleverly concealed in the back wall. “I expect you approve of my new offices?”

“I think you mean _our_ offices,” Shepard replies with an ugly smile. Von's arms swing wide, a sign of conciliation.

“Yes, yes,” he says, puffing into his chair, gesturing for her to sit across the desk. “I'm pleased we could find the time to meet.”

He walks her through the full history of her sudden fortune, from the initial investment after Virmire to the present, complete with charts and graphs and his reedy, self-aggrandizing little laughter.

She'd been clueless, at first, just sitting on a few hundred thousand credits: prize money from Pinnacle Station, unexpected profit from trading salvaged equipment, Council funding for every new charted planet. A Navy brat through-and-through, who felt paying someone to cut her hair was a luxury, who wore the same off-duty boots for three years straight, finding herself suddenly more than flush. Military funding was nothing to spit at, of course, but the numbers Von keeps throwing out are almost inconceivable.

She'd always spent most of her credits on everyone else, upgrading armor and weapons at every port—an ultimately useless gesture, as it turned out. The Vindicator is passable, but her hands itch for her old HMWA X. Even the Carnifex on her hip feels off somehow, unwieldy in her grip. Her armor never fits right.

The presentation takes long enough that Von orders lunch for them both, his asari flitting around with trays and glasses. Shepard does not touch the food, hands folded, concentrated on the tiny flashing light of the volus's mouth.

“As you can see,” he wheezes, pleased with himself, “just as I said. All clean, all above-the-board, all legal, all _yours_.”

Shepard digs a finger into her thigh, tracing over the edge of a seam.

“And no one knows about the funds,” she says. “I came to you because you promised anonymity. There's no one in the galaxy that knows about my money except you and me.”

She has to imagine the fear on his face but is satisfied by his tightened posture, the slowed movement of his hands across the desk.

“This doesn't have to be a threat,” she continues, emotionless. “I just need your assurance that the Shadow Broker, that Cerberus, won't be a problem for me.”

“Not,” he says carefully, “in these matters, Commander. They know nothing.”

He is obviously glad to see her go, taking her only as far as the foyer, scuttling back through the imposing glass doors, ducking her goodbye.

In the cab, she sits straight, hands locked over her kneecaps, thumbs knocking together with each slight twist through the lanes. She spends the ride in silence and nearly forgets to pay.

Anderson's receptionist is paranoid, staring over her shoulder for an escort.

“I'm alone,” she says shortly. “I'm going in.”

Anderson looks up from his console when she enters, chin resting on his fist, eyes hooded with boredom.

“Commander,” he says with a warm smile. “The inspectors are just finishing up.”

She says nothing, arranging herself in the provided chair, knees together, shoulders back.

“Parade rest is fine,” Anderson continues dryly. “How are you, Shepard?”

She blinks.

“Fine.”

“Is that so.”

Not a question, so she feels no obligation to answer. Anderson leans back in his chair.

“You're going to tell me,” he says lightly. “We're friends, remember?”

“No,” Shepard says. “I don't.”

She regrets it instantly. She can't summon the energy to joke, so he takes her only at her meaning, frowning. Examination infuriates her—she squirms, unable to force herself still. She's in fatigues today, or Cerberus's excuse for them anyway, all those unnecessary buckles and pouches, bright orange insignia blasting from each shoulder. She had been so careful that morning, arranging her short hair, scrubbing sleep from beneath her eyes. She hadn't bothered with a mirror, and there's no reflection to guess.

Escape is suddenly necessary—she stands, shoving off from the desk, putting another chair and table between them.

“I'm trying to decide how honest I want to be with you,” Anderson says, sighing. “Don't you have anything to ask me?”

It is a trap. She speaks cautiously, fingertips pushing against her hip with each syllable.

“I don't have anything to ask.”

“Not even about Kaidan?”

Unavoidable, then, as her face twists and her stomach drops.

“He was here, you know,” Anderson says. “Just yesterday. You hadn't heard?”

“No. No one told me.”

“I thought Garrus and Tali might have. They stopped by as well.”

“I haven't seen them.”

She considers sitting again, head down, staring at her boots.

“You're scaring me, Jane.”

“I'm not trying to.”

He sighs again and stands, but she flinches away from his proximity.

“I'm sorry,” she says. “I know you want to help. I just don't know what I can tell you.”

After a few minutes of stilted, formal speech, she leaves them both dissatisfied, folding herself into the cab with a frown.

“Please,” she says to the salarian at the controls, “just drive.”

Scattered—that's the word, she thinks, the best descriptor for the sensation of compartmentalizing herself for each interaction. Anderson had wanted her reaction, had pushed and pulled her as a test, and she had failed. She is not as unchanged as she hopes, and it is showing.

Garrus and Tali. Her oldest friends, really, at least of those still alive. Uncertain of her, so they seek out assistance—Shepard grimaces, happy they'd never met her mother. They deserve better from their commander, from their friend.

She is so tired. Sighing, she sinks into the cushion, eyes falling closed. Scattered, torn, stretched in so many different directions. If she cannot pull herself together, then she will go out to each separate part.

Barla Von, for all his fumbling greed, has opened a window for her: credits mean independence. Four billion for her life is meaningless to her, but fifty-thousand for a pistol firing mechanism, twenty-seven for omnitool software upgrades, those are tangible irritants that once sent her grovelling to Miranda every week. Freedom is a step too far, but at least she might not be so dependent on Cerberus's goodwill.

She frowns again, shifting her sore shoulder against the safety belt.

An apology will be necessary—she can ask Kelly to look into volus customs, or maybe she'll just institute a small increase in his percentage. The sheer effort required to continue existing has drained her of social niceties, of politeness, of humor. 

Anderson will need an excuse as well, but his ambush was uncalled for. No, she hadn't wanted to examine any of it, least of all in front of him. She wanted stability, wanted to speak shallowly and then leave—anger rises in her, a heat swelling rapidly around her heart. Deep breaths push it back down, filling her limbs with heaviness.

Kaidan—a walking open wound into which she poured a pound of salt just by saying his name. That he had been in Anderson's office, spoken to him less than a day before, had sat, perhaps, in the same chair, in the same posture, was more than she could consider.

Time, as money, is meaningless to her. Two years to him may have been a lifetime. Her stomach turns, the memory so close she can still feel the warmth of his arms around her. On Horizon, for her, it felt like only a few months since they'd last seen each other, since they'd stolen two weeks together on Intai'sei.

Even then, flooded with relief at seeing him alive, tingling with adrenaline, she'd felt a stab of fear. Miranda's eyes on her back prevented the reunion Shepard had wanted, forced them into an awkward hug and stiff handshake.

How long had she let his message linger, unread, out of fear? Certain that her eyes were not the first to see it, to understand the affection implied. So much of her new existence is focused on negotiation, giving the Illusive Man just enough to get back what she needs. To have her hand so easily, so obviously tipped...

The cab is warm, soothing in its simple motion, and she lets herself be lulled to sleep.

She dreams of Kaidan, above her, smiling, one hand disappearing into the bedclothes covering her hip, his mouth at her ear.

“Jane,” he whispers, “I have to go.”

Red, orange, yellow. Flames—certainly there's heat. She breathes in and smells nothing like smoke. She is stretched beneath a burning moon, arm cast over her eyes, the _Normandy_ 's hum matching the rumble in his chest.

“Jane, I have to go now.”

No. _Her_ bed, her apartment, the red-orange sands of Intai'sei pelting against the window, a tide that never recedes. His arm is trapped beneath her head, beneath the spray of red-orange hair across the pillow. He traces the speckled gold curve of her shoulder with his lips.

“Jane.”

If she opens her eyes, he will leave. So she smiles and rolls over, teasing, sliding one of her legs between his. Their skin sticks together at the joints, bright red arrows of articulation. She presses her nose into his neck, every feathery exhalation escaping across his clavicle.

It's not enough to keep him, not really, and beneath her fingers his muscles work, stretching, flattening, contorting under the skin. He looses mass, becomes smaller in her arms, thin and wiry.

She opens her eyes, and Toombs grins from beneath her, sweat-soaked, gaze unfocused in pleasure.

“I have to go,” she says, hands flat over his heart.

“Don't,” he suggests. “Stay with me.”

He shifts their joined bodies, pushing her up and away.

“Stay with me, Jane,” he says again, and it's an order, shouted into her ear, and they're standing, scrambling up the side of a Mako. His hands on her thighs, she pulls herself with one arm, the other limp and useless at her side. She rolls and turns to help him up. His face is soaked in blood, eyes bright.

“Listen to me,” he says. “Set the beacon, and—”

The ground rumbles, and his head whips back, staring into the darkness.

“Wake up.”

His lips don't match the words. He turns to face her, reaching out, smiling sadly.

“What?”

“Please, wake up.”

The salarian cab driver is shaking her knee, gently, voice barely above a whisper. He notices her open eyes and jumps away.

“I'm so sorry,” he stutters. “It's just, you fell asleep, and my shift is over, and—”

“No, of course. I'm sorry,” Shepard says, stretching the dream from her limbs. “I understand.”

“I can, um, run you somewhere, still, if you want.”

“That's alright. Here's as good as anywhere else.”

She exits and over-tips, and then stands in an unfamiliar market, watching his taillights disappear into traffic.


	5. Four

** Four **

Tali forgives him enough to share a hotel room, though she's still unwilling to talk, lying on her side, away from him, facing the wall. She doesn't object when Garrus joins, but he doesn't test it, settling carefully on the bed. It's a decent enough place, but he feels justified in questioning the cleanliness of the carpet. So he keeps quiet, hands folded over his chest, staring up at the ceiling.

At breakfast, he is tired, and it shows. Tali, conciliatory, reaches beneath her seat for a package marked _RE_.

“I found you a new scope,” she says shyly, holding out the bag. “I remember you complaining about your Viper and thought...”

She shrugs, and he takes it.

“Thank you,” he says, somewhat uncertain. “If I apologize for yesterday, can we start over?”

“You can apologize,” she says, and there's something sad in her voice. “But there's no starting over, Garrus.”

An impersonal message from Shepard's VI informs them simultaneously that the _Normandy_ will be open to the crew in less than three hours, so they pay for their food and wander the Presidium. Tali takes his hand almost on reflex, unthinking, worming her fingers between his.

“I know you don't want to talk about it,” she says. “But Garrus, it was so long ago. Kaidan's forgotten it.”

“No, he hasn't,” Garrus says sharply and pushes down his irritation. “He was thinking about it, too. You know he's never apologized?”

“For what? _Sorry my face got in the way of your fists_?”

He pulls away from her, marching down to an empty balcony. The market behind them buzzes with activity, and from here, they can see cars leaving the embassies. Garrus sets his elbows on the rail and stares down, into the distant fountain.

“I was there, Garrus,” she says, stopping a few meters behind. “I remember what happened, what he said, what _you_ said—”

“Why are you so intent on blaming _me_?”

“I don't,” she says softly. “I don't think Kaidan does, either. You were both in pain, both too stubborn to share it with others.”

“You didn't need any more pain. You were on the _Normandy_. You had it bad enough.”

“Kaidan was on the _Normandy_ , too.”

He sees her logic, and it infuriates him. His talons close around the rail, gouging marks in the metal.

“Don't get angry,” she says, touching his shoulder. “I'm sorry. We don't have to talk about it.”

So they head back to the dock in silence, joining the disgruntled queue at the _Normandy_ 's airlock. Joker is perched on a pile of crates, picking at a loose seam on his sleeve.

“Don't tell her I said it,” he says when they approach, “but this was total bullshit.”

He gives them an appraising look, chin balanced on his fist.

“So. How was your shore leave?”

“Unproductive,” Tali says, leaning beside him. “But you'll never guess who we ran into.”

“Kaidan.”

He shrugs off her surprise.

“I saw him leaving, after Jack and Miranda's little almost-blow-out. Don't think he saw me.”

He's staring at Garrus, specifically, for a reaction, but gets nothing.

“Speaking of, though,” Joker says, sighing, “do you know if Jack made it through the night in at least one piece?”

“We were busy,” Tali replies.

“Busy with whatever's fucked up with Shepard, right?”

He glances between them.

“Just saying. Not that anyone talks to _me_.”

Tali takes his arm, and he parts the sea of crewmen and fords a path for them to the front.

“Disabled privilege!” he says cheerily. “You get normal bones—I get to cut the line!”

So they're the first to board the _Normandy_ , the first to see Mordin's grin and Shepard's silent frown.

“Enjoy yourselves?” Mordin asks.

“The hell? How come you get back on first?”

Mordin shrugs at Joker.

“Never left.”

Shepard says nothing, meeting Garrus's eyes once before turning away, folding herself into the rush and disappearing into the elevator. The temptation to follow is strong, and it guides him as far as the Med Bay before Tali grabs him and redirects his energy to the battery.

“We _need_ a plan,” she hisses, hacking a quick lock on the door.

“We had one, remember? Didn't work out so well.”

“So, what, we just go stomping after her and demand answers?”

“Why not?”

“Garrus, don't be stupid.”

He growls and paces the floor, but concedes. Tali folds herself onto his cot, fingers drumming her faceplate, thinking.

“What do we say to her?”

So they write a script, a stilted mess of conversation starters, and then they wait, stretching every thought to its awkward conclusion. After a few hours, Garrus has had enough.

“I suppose we should go,” he says. “EDI, where's the commander?”

“Commander Shepard is currently in her cabin. She is training and has requested that she not be disturbed. Would you like to leave a message?”

“Um, no.”

“Very well. Logging you out.”

Sluggishly, they march out of the battery, not speaking, not looking at each other. The mess is empty, most of the crew away at duties, but Chakwas ambushes them at the elevator.

“Are you going up to see her?” she demands, wringing her hands.

“To Shepard?” Tali asks. “Why?”

Chakwas's reluctance is familiar, a shadow of their meeting with Anderson. She leans in, beckoning them closer.

“Please, someone has to talk to her. She wouldn't hear anything from me, but I'm hoping—”

“What happened?” Garrus asks sharply. “Is everything okay?”

“I can't tell you any specifics,” Chakwas grimaces. “Confidentiality, you know.”

“Yeah, we've been getting that a lot lately,” Garrus says, thinking of Kaidan. Tali throws him a disapproving head-tilt, but Chakwas is oblivious.

“Look, all I can say is that she needs someone. I'm worried about her. Please, go speak to her.”

“We were just heading there,” Tali says.

“Thank you.”

Garrus fidgets in the elevator, kicking his feet together, fiddling with the catches on his gauntlets. Tali just breathes. They step off together, and he hesitates at the door.

“Maybe we should have asked first.”

“Coward,” Tali sighs, reaching around him to knock firmly. “Shepard, it's Tali and Garrus! Can we come in?”

They lean in together, hearing only a wave of blows on a training bag.

“C'mon, Shepard,” Garrus says. “We just want to talk to you.”

“So you drew the short straws?”

“What?”

“Never mind,” Shepard says sharply. “Come in.”

The door unlocks, and they enter slowly. Shepard is stripped down to shorts and an undershirt, coated in a fine sheen of sweat, panting. She watches them as far as the steps and then turns back to the bag.

“Let me guess,” she says between short jabs, “you two went to see Anderson, and he was no help. So then you tried to decide what to do on your own. How to approach me.”

“We ran into Chakwas on the way up,” Garrus says, and her next punch lands off-center, knuckles sliding over the side of the bag.

“She didn't tell you anything.”

“She didn't have to. No one did, really. Shepard, what's going on?”

She ignores his question.

“Miranda's too scared to say anything, even to Jacob. And Jack still has that prison mentality—circle up against the guards, keep quiet no matter the cost.”

With a little cold laugh, she pauses, wiping her brow on the back of her hand, dragging her tangled hair along.

“But everybody talks, eventually. Even me.”

“And what are you talking about?” Garrus asks carefully. “Shepard, what happened? Jack said that she found something in Cerberus's files, something she wouldn't tell us about but that you—”

“You can watch it—I don't care.”

She indicates a datapad on the desk.

“What is it?”

But Shepard is finished with them, returning to the bag with new vigor. Tali takes the datapad, and Garrus, with another concerned glance at Shepard, watches over her shoulder.

It contains a single surveillance vid, grainy and unfocused, tinged orange.

_“Is it recording?”_

_“Of course it is.”_

Miranda's face fills the frame, mouth tight in anger. She adjusts the camera and steps back, revealing a large operating theater behind her, occupied by a ring of machines and personnel gathered around a single bed.

_“So if we screw anything up, it's all on vid.”_

_“And the Illusive Man will know exactly who to blame.”_

She addresses this last statement to a man across the room, who sits at the end of the bed, adjusting something with his omnitool.

_“Have a little faith. Wilson, vitals?”_

_“Stable. We can start the walk-back when you're ready.”_

_“Excellent. Miranda, any last words?”_

_“Yes. I want to reiterate that I am entirely against this operational offshoot. We should have terminated at the beginning. We're risking the subject for no reason.”_

The man grins at her, holding his arms open.

_“No reason? The miracle of life. I thought you'd appreciate that.”_

Miranda says nothing, allowing her posture to communicate her irritation. She shoves aside some equipment as she takes her place, unveiling the bed's occupant with a slight flourish: Shepard, unconscious. She is almost indistinguishable from the bed, wrapped from the neck down in thick thermal bandages. Her face is smooth and empty, arms flat at her sides, limp legs propped up in a pair of stirrups bolted to the end of the bed. Her midsection is hugely swollen.

_“Ten centimeters. Fully effaced, and contractions at less than three minutes. Wilson, begin the walk-back.”_

_“Yes, sir.”_

Garrus can hear Shepard behind them still, slamming her bare fists into the bag over and over, breath escaping in quiet grunts.

 _“She's coming around,”_ Miranda says. _“You promised—”_

 _“Twilight sedation. No fuss, no memories,”_ the man replies, repositioning his stool between Shepard's legs. She begins to stir, head rolling gently side to side, fingers twitching.

_“What's happening?”_

Her words are slurred and quiet. She struggles to open her eyes and fails, as Wilson captures one of her wandering hands.

_“It's alright, Commander. You're alright.”_

_“I don't...”_

She shakes her head, drawing her tongue across dry lips.

_“What's happening to me? Where...?”_

_“You're alright, Shepard.”_

_“Heart-rate's spiking,”_ Miranda announces, sounding almost satisfied.

 _“We expected that,”_ the man snaps back, undeterred.

_“She's in distress.”_

Shepard pulls away from Wilson, eyes opening at last. She passes her hands over her face, down her neck and chest, to her middle. She sounds terrified.

_“Where am I? What's going on?”_

_“BP's low—oxygen levels falling.”_

_“I can see the monitors, Miranda.”_

_“Please, what's happening?”_

Shepard's breathing speeds up, on the vid and behind them.

 _“You're alright, Commander,”_ Miranda says dismissively. _“Everything will be fine.”_

_“I don't understand what's happening.”_

_“You're having a baby,”_ Wilson volunteers. _“Remember?”_

_“No, I...”_

Shepard struggles, pushing back at him, suddenly aware of the bandages and machines.

_“This isn't right. This...”_

She swallows around something, eyes wide, hands connecting with the rails of the bed, tangling the wires. The man at her feet holds her down in the stirrups.

_“I remember—Kaidan? He should be here. Where's Kaidan?”_

_“Wilson, hold her!”_ Miranda snaps. _“Give her another dose!”_

The drug moves quickly—Shepard's arms fall across her chest and her ragged breathing slows.

 _“Kaidan?”_ the man muses. _“Does she mean Alenko? He was on the shortlist.”_

Shepard moans, face wet with tears.

 _“He should be here,”_ she slurs. _“Kaidan should be here.”_

 _“He's coming,”_ Wilson says uncomfortably. _“He'll be here.”_

_“I can't do this. I need him. Please, I can't.”_

_“Of course you can,”_ Miranda says.

 _“Your active participation is hardly required,”_ the man says, occupied beneath the sheet he had draped over Shepard's knees. He throws a casual glance to Miranda, smirking, and she scowls.

_“No, I...I need him. He was here. I can't be alone.”_

Miranda waves her omnitool over the bed with an impatient huff.

_“Computer, voice emulation: Systems Alliance Navy.”_

_“Loading. Specify.”_

_“Staff Commander Kaidan Alenko.”_

_“Accepted.”_

_“Calm her down, Wilson!”_

Kaidan's voice flows unnaturally from the tech's mouth, and Shepard makes a choked noise of pain, punches faltering.

_“I'm here, Shepard.”_

_“Kaidan?”_

_“I'm here. Everything's going to be alright.”_

_“I'm scared.”_

_“Don't worry.”_

_“I don't remember. What's happening to me?”_

Her eyelids flutter, too heavy to reopen. Wilson places a hand on her forehead.

_“It'll be over soon, Shepard. I promise.”_

_“I'm...a baby? I don't...”_

_“Shh. It's alright.”_

_“Commander,”_ the other man interjects. _“Commander, I need you to push now.”_

He appears to do most of the work. Shepard whimpers and sobs, face pinched in pain, Wilson holding her shoulders and whispering with Kaidan's voice. Miranda remains impassively still at the head, arms crossed, completely detached. After ten minutes, a tiny cry pierces the operating theater. Shepard gasps, head falling back, breath short and unsteady.

 _“Increasing dosage,”_ Miranda says, as the man pulls the infant from Shepard's body and holds it up.

 _“A boy,”_ he tells her. _“Project Lazarus, Subject Beta.”_

Shepard whispers something inaudible, already slipping away, as Miranda and Wilson begin to disassemble the machinery. The infant is placed in a waiting plastic cradle across the room.

Garrus doesn't need to see the end. He turns away and steps down to Shepard, who cannot meet his eyes. Her own are focused straight ahead, narrowed, following each firm hit as it leaves a fresh smear of blood across the bag.


	6. Five

** Five **

“I'm sorry,” Garrus says.

“Not your fault,” Shepard replies, and she's right: her hands are shaking too much, knocking into his as he tries to gently clean her bleeding knuckles. Tali watches, propped up against the opposite wall.

“So you didn't know about the pregnancy?”

“No. That early, I wouldn't, unless I went specifically to get tested.”

Tali nods, considering.

“And you didn't notice any physical changes? Then or now?”

“I don't...I don't know. After I saw—”

Shepard swallows, blinking, as Garrus turns her hands over and begins winding gauze around her palm.

“After I saw it, I went to Chakwas. Asked her to do scans, just to see...you know, if it was true. If it had happened.”

She winces at the contact.

“I felt—I _feel_ different, but I thought it was just the implants, just Cerberus, what they'd done.”

“It _is_ what they did,” Garrus says quietly.

“Did Chakwas's scans show anything?”

“Tiny changes, things you wouldn't see unless...unless you were looking for them. Muscles, bones...but it was there. Miranda covered it up, assumed I wouldn't want to sit through another physical. She gave Chakwas doctored scans.”

“Your skeletal structure changes, but you didn't notice?”

“Most of the time, it's temporary. Stuff like a microscopic widening of the pelvis, strain on the spine. Some of it's permanent. Changes in...changes in some organs. Internal. Where you'd have to look for it.”

She's not in the mood for a biology lecture, folding up against the attention.

“It's different with quarians,” Tali says, shrugging. “Every pregnancy is planned, down to the last detail—it has to be. I can't imagine just spontaneously—”

“We have methods to prevent it,” Shepard says. “They're not perfect.”

She pulls her hands away from Garrus and leans back into the cushions, fingertips pressed against her eyelids. Anger is gone, mostly, replaced by an exhausted relief. Maybe it's enough just to have someone else know, to not carry this alone, wrapped around her ribs.

“I could've been four, five, maybe six weeks, when I died. I don't know for sure. Most human women don't know until they've missed menstruation, and since most birth control suppresses menstruation...”

“Do you remember,” Garrus says delicately, “what we saw? Actually giving birth?”

She opens her eyes and looks at him, frowning, uncertain.

“I could make myself remember. The vid's there, and I'm sure I could invent memories to match, but...honestly, no. I remember little snatches of things. Consciousness, briefly, followed by pain. Faces, lips moving without sound, voices with no source. There was nothing on the station— _nothing_ to even hint that there'd been a baby, that I...”

She struggles with the words, with the reality of it. She'd understood what had happened, what she was seeing, but couldn't acknowledge it, and so it consumed her, chewed the edges of her waking hours raw.

“I am a mother,” she says, quietly, to the ceiling, testing the weight of the words as they roll off her tongue. “Somewhere out there. I have a son.”

“What do you want to do, Shepard?” Garrus asks carefully, and she bites back her immediate response.

She wants go back two years, ten years, back to her childhood even, if possible. She wants to tear Miranda limb from limb, crush her bones and burn what's left. To Ontarom, to Akuze, to the quiet of her mother's apartment. She wants to go back to those two perfect weeks on Intai'sei, with Kaidan, to warmth and peace and quiet.

“I don't know. What should I do? What _can_ I do?”

“Commander Shepard,” EDI interrupts suddenly, and Garrus's head whips around to the speaker, “Mr. Moreau wishes me to inform you that we have passed through the Citadel relay and are en-route to Illium. Our ETA is approximately ten hours.”

“Thank you, EDI.”

Tali glances warily at the ceiling.

“Should we be having this conversation here?”

“That was my shore leave,” Shepard says. “Mordin and I went through the whole ship. I had EDI shut down for the inspectors, so we cleaned everything out.”

“Does Cerberus know?” Garrus asks.

“Not yet. Illusive Man didn't say anything about it, at least.”

“What did he want?”

Shepard makes a noise of derision in her throat.

“To pay back Liara for _assistance rendered_.”

“What assistance?” Tali asks, bemused.

“She sold me to them,” Shepard says, empty. “My body. She gave my body to Cerberus. He must've noticed my distraction. Needed to tug the leash a little.”

“Shepard.”

She turns her head to Garrus.

“What do you want to do?”

“My answer didn't change in the last ten minutes, Garrus.”

“Then you need to think about it,” he says, not cruel but firm. Shepard straightens from her slouch, turning her bandaged hands over. “The Collectors are a real threat. Cerberus didn't invent it, and we have evidence now. Maybe the Council will—”

“The Council won't do anything they don't have to,” Shepard says shortly. “And they've made clear how little interest they have in helping me.”

“So we're stuck, then. This mission isn't exactly paying for itself,” Garrus says.

“We don't need their money.”

Shepard gives a bitter laugh.

“Turns out you can still collect interest, even when you're dead.”

There's a brief flicker of emotion through his mandibles—envy, or surprise.

“So let's leave,” he says. “Tell the Illusive Man to fuck off and go after the Collectors alone.”

“With a crew full of Cerberus?”

“Most of them are loyal to _you_ , Shepard.”

“Not all of them.”

But now Garrus has a plan, and he's not letting go.

“They can't reel us in—”

“They _can_.”

“He doesn't have the resources to come after you if—”

“He doesn't have to target _me_.”

He seems to get it and shuts up. Or maybe Tali silences him—Shepard's dropped her head into her hands and stares at the patch of floor between her bare feet.

“Do you think he will use your child against you?” Tali says.

“I think he'll use anything and everything he can to get me to do what he wants. Why do you think you're here?”

Garrus balks.

“You didn't know it was me, when you showed up on Omega.”

“ _He_ knew. I'd bet you anything Miranda knew.”

Shepard shoves off from the cushions, releasing a torrent of fiery pain from her knuckles up her arms, pacing all the way to the door and back again. The training bag's been shoved into her desk, blocking her flashing terminal, but she can feel the responsibility nipping at her heels.

“This whole fucking thing is a setup. They had two years to obsess over me, to figure me out. Miranda's orders were to bring me back exactly as I was—you know, she wanted to implant a control chip, and the Illusive Man shot her down? Everything that's happened—everything I've done since waking up has been on _his_ path, on _his_ timeline. You, Mordin, Jack, Grunt, Zaeed, Kasumi. Chakwas. Joker. Surround me with familiars, with people who'd been burned by the Alliance, Spectres, the Council. He wanted my trust, and he had it.”

Fury at herself closes her throat, and Shepard stops at the door, flexing her fingers beneath broken skin.

“Who do you trust, Shepard?”

She doesn't think about it, hoping instinct will hold the truth.

“You two. Mordin. Chakwas, I guess.”

“Not Jack?” Tali asks, amused.

“Jack has her own agenda.”

“What about Joker?”

She considers, examining her bitten nails.

“I don't know,” she says haltingly. “He was on the second station, the first thing I saw after Freedom's Progress. I keep thinking, if Veetor hadn't been there, if he didn't have that vid of the Collectors...”

She sighs, pressing her fingertips into the wall, soaking in the cold.

“It was the perfect choice, to make me feel safe. I suggested all of you, and he had every excuse ready. And then, of everyone, he already has Joker, _Jeff_...”

They can understand that, she hopes, the way Joker was for her, the reassuring voice that always called her home, the quiet hum of comfort in her ear.

“Joker,” Garrus says, opening a channel. “Could you come up to the Commander's cabin for a minute?”

“Uh, yeah. Just give me fifteen.”

He shrugs at her nonplussed look.

“I'd rather get it over with now,” he says. “Unless you want to spend another three months pacing around it? If you ask, you'll know.”

He's right, of course, but the fear of confrontation burns in her chest, pushes her back against the desk. The holoframe remains face-down, and she perches next it, knocking everything else aside. Joker makes the trip in ten, knocking a crutch against the door.

“It's open,” Shepard says, and he enters, head swinging around to survey the room.

“Hey, Commander,” he says cautiously. “What's up?”

“Have a seat,” Garrus says over her silence. “We need to talk to you.”

Tali helps him down to the couch and sits herself, folding her legs beneath her. After a moment, Shepard follows, shoving off the desk. The sweat on her skin and in her clothes hasn't quite dried, and she shivers passing beneath a vent. Sitting still is beyond her capacity, so she paces at the foot of her bed, rubbing heat back into her arms. Joker watches warily, chancing the occasional questioning glance to Tali and Garrus.

“I need to ask you something,” Shepard says at last.

“Um, okay.”

Relief was only a veil—her throat closes, and she halts, picking at her bandages, remembering suddenly what she's wearing. Most of her implantation scars have disappeared, and the bruises have faded in places, but she feels as blank and naked as a mannequin in a window. They—her friends, staring up with such emphatic concern, watching her every twitch and shudder—they don't see what's missing, the weak welding at her joints, the thinning tissue that keeps her from spilling out.

“I,” she says, swallows, starts again, “I need to know how you got involved with Cerberus. What you knew about me, about the project, and when you knew it.”

“You mean, was I recruited? Yeah.”

He glances at Tali, questioning, and receives an encouraging nod.

“A couple months after you died, I lost my flight status. I had some leave saved up, so I took it. Went home, spent time with my family. I love the Alliance, but I didn't want to go back if I couldn't fly, and all my appeals got me shit.”

He sighs, leaning forward.

“It was my dad. They're out on Tiptree, you know, edge of the Traverse? Abductions hadn't really started, but there were always rumors. Dad heard from a neighbor who heard from a friend who heard from a guy that colonial militias were forming. I started putting out feelers, you know, see if maybe someone needed a pilot.”

She nods at his pause.

“You have to understand,” he pleads. “That first year after you died was awful. Anderson was losing battles left and right, and the Alliance doubled down on you being a nutjob. I got approached by someone, some guy who'd been slumming around the port, bugging people about joining up. He made me an offer, and I took it. It wasn't a trick or anything, I knew it was Cerberus, but at the time, I didn't care. All I wanted was to fly, and forget about everything that happened.”

Garrus is looking to her for a clue, but she focuses on the floor.

“Is...is that really why you called me up here? Just to find out how Cerberus got me?”

“Could you answer the second part? When did you find out about me?”

“About an hour before I saw you,” he says immediately. “I'd flown a transport to that station about a week prior, offloading troops and supplies. The guy in charge told me I was temporarily reassigned and would have to stay. At first I was pissed, but they gave me a decent room, and suddenly little things started to slip. Like I knew I was being held for a special piloting job, then I knew it was a prototype ship, then it was based on an old Alliance ship, then it was the _Normandy_ 2.0, and finally another operative briefed me about your mission to Freedom's Progress. Didn't say it was _you_ , just that I had been selected, that I would be part of a mission to take down the Collectors. How could I say no, after what happened?”

He reaches out—she's moved close enough to touch, she realizes, and backs quickly away. Joker looks momentarily wounded but recovers, setting his hand back in his lap.

“That day, I was taken to this side room and told to wait. I asked the guards what was going on, but they had no idea. I started hearing your name, and thought...I don't know. That you were alive, I guess. I remember that thought popping into my head and then dismissing it, like, no one's that powerful. Not even Cerberus. But then Miranda came in and explained the project to me, said that you were alive, and I was going to get to see you.”

“What did she say about the project?”

“Commander, where are you going with this?” he says. “I'm starting to feel like this is an interrogation.”

“It is,” Shepard admits, finally dropping into the chair. “Cerberus did something to me that they chose not to tell me about. If you knew about it, then I don't trust you.”

“She just said they'd brought you back. Not a clone, not some VI. _You_.”

Her eyes fall on the datapad, cast aside on the coffee-table.

“Go take this somewhere private,” she says, flicking the edge of the pad towards Garrus. “Show him, and tell him what I told you. I'm tired now.”

They file out, and she falls onto the bed. She sleeps, and doesn't dream.


	7. Six

** Six **

“It's safe to say the conspiracy won't leave this room.”

“Conspiracy, Joker?” Tali says, amused. “ _Really_?”

“It involves espionage and more than five people. So, yes, conspiracy.”

“Who's the _more than_?”

“Chakwas.”

Garrus nods, leaning into the bulwark. Joker sits cross-legged on the cot, turning the datapad over and over in his hands.

“You guys just found out?”

“A few minutes before you,” Tali says.

“This is so fucked up. Are we leaving?”

“Not yet. We don't need their resources, but we can't risk it.”

“Don't need?” Joker repeats. “Um, how fucking loaded _is_ she?”

“No numbers,” Tali says, with a disapproving click of her tongue. “I don't think she knows what to do with it.”

“So what the fuck are _we_ going to do?”

“Whatever Shepard tells us,” Garrus says firmly.

An easy sentiment at the time, he reflects, almost sixty hours later, as he watches the empty shuttle spin away into the storm over Hagalaz.

“I'm sure the Shadow Broker has shuttles,” Shepard says. “Besides, did we really want Cerberus to know where we are?”

She doesn't wait for their answer, pulling her assault rifle from its slot and hunching forward against the storm. Liara casts him a look of near-terror, but he shrugs and falls in line behind Tali. Shepard had been right about the autopilot, and they still have a beacon to contact Joker. The _Normandy_ is sitting in the Tasale system, most of the crew taking shore leave again, but they're on standby and ready to jump, Joker had promised, at a moment's notice.

Garrus is guessing, though, that they'll need more than a moment, as they scuttle across the Shadow Broker's ship. Office life has sapped Liara of strength: at every slight incline she scrambles and _oofs_ her way along, whining quietly into his earpiece. He doesn't respond and neither does Tali, so Liara darts ahead, attempting to engage Shepard in some banter, but she is single-minded, focused on the goal. She sends her drone ahead with Tali's, to scrub the surface of mechs.

“Keep an eye on your motion-trackers,” she says. “There've been way too many surprises on this run.”

Irony—not that she'd appreciate it. Garrus follows obediently, adjusting his visor. The storm is messing with his thermal scanners, creating wispy white ghosts of cold, green flares of heat. At this distance, Shepard flickers in and out, a bad signal on a poor receiver.

They haven't said anything more about Cerberus or the child. Not that there'd been much of a chance, really, with everything happening so quickly. He still can't quite believe that they'd killed a Spectre— _Vasir_ , no less, someone he'd heard about back in his Academy days, a legend for her cunning and kill count. But it was all above-board, and they wouldn't be faulted: Spectres shouldn't pledge allegiance to anyone but the Council.

Still, it unnerves him. Everything they are doing—have done, have yet to do—falls into that uncomfortable grey area for him, that untenable mist of what he cannot control. He won't dwell, either, having wasted all that effort on Sidonis. He will focus. He will face forward, will fall into line.

And he will keep Shepard focused, as well. He is nothing if not her right hand, her eyes, her—

“Garrus, watch the left flank!” Shepard snaps, sending a plasma burst past his head.

He can't snipe for shit in this storm, swapping out with a curse.

“How long is this going to take, Liara?”

“I don't know, Garrus. I've never broken into the Shadow Broker's base before!”

Tali laughs, a little short and cruel, ducking behind Garrus and throwing a fast hack towards the swarm of turrets.

“Hit the capacitors, idiot!” she says to him, and he shoots with a growl, lightning arcing out from the impact. The Broker's forces are just this side of overwhelming, more than enough that he should pay better attention, but less than enough to keep Shepard distracted. She huddles at the door, urging Liara's lock bypass along with a few new lines of code.

“Shepard, it's the most advanced hack I could find!”

“There's always room for improvement.”

It certainly helps her case when the door slams open mere seconds later, and they quickly scramble inside. Tali shoves him along through the corridors, watching his back as he watches Shepard's, grumbling under her breath at the disarray. He's thankful for the Broker's practicality, even if it's a little boring: no plazas, no rows of hedges or flower pots. No stacks of precariously perched antiques.

They reach Feron quickly enough—Shepard shows little interest in helping him, only in what he can tell her, how he can propel her forward. Maybe she's enjoying Liara's torment a little.

He misses the big fight—so busy watching Shepard's back he doesn't see a significant chunk of the ceiling flying at him until it's too late to dodge. Tali wakes him when it's over, shaking his shoulder roughly.

“Self-sabotaging idiotic _bosh'tet_ ,” she grumbles.

“Did we win?”

“No thanks to _you_.”

He sits up under his own power as Tali plops down beside him.

“Little thanks to Liara, either,” she continues, tossing aside her shotgun. It's broken, a half-dead rodent twitching across the floor, unable to collapse on itself. “Can't make a move without shouting it across the room. _Singularity. Stasis. Shepard, get him to bring up the shield again_.”

“Thought you were friends.”

“So did I,” Tali sighs, unfolding a roll of precision tools from her belt. “Sometimes it feels like more than two years.”

He glances around the room—his first impression having been nothing more than debris and a flash of white, but he's impressed by the size. Liara stands at a bank of holo screens, tapping the haptic controls hesitantly. He's guessing the pile of dust in the center of the room is what's left of the old Shadow Broker, stirred together by the air circulating through the room.

“Where's Shepard?” Garrus asks, activating his omnitool for a quick diagnostic. His armor's mostly intact, and the trauma protocol did its job—he'll have a decent headache in about an hour, but nothing lasting. Tali waves away his assistance when he turns to her, preferring her own software.

“Finding the shuttles. She wants to get back to the _Normandy_ as soon as possible.”

Tali gives him a vague layout and directs further questions to a floating infodrone, who cheerily guides him to the hangar.

“Will there be anything else, Shadow Broker?”

“Um, no.”

Shepard's armor lies in an oddly expressive pile next to the door: gauntlets akimbo, chest-plate resting against the column, gloves pointing down a row of decent-looking cars and gunships. He follows the suggested line to its end, where Shepard's boots poke out from beneath the belly of a Kodiak.

“I feel like I'm going to find your shell around here somewhere.”

“You're the one with the carapace, not me.”

He kneels, brushing her leg accidentally, and she jumps, something fleshy hitting something metal.

“Fuck!” she says, and now there's a metal-on-metal clang of dropping tools.

“Sorry.”

“No, it's—I just wasn't—”

She scoots out, finger in her mouth, and sits up, ignoring his outstretched hand.

“What do you want?”

He blinks, confused himself on that point.

“Do you need some help?”

She examines her knuckle, bright red but otherwise undamaged.

“I'm fine,” she says shortly. “Was that all?”

“What are you doing?”

“I tried reprogramming the blackbox for _Normandy_ 's IFF. No go.”

“So you're pulling it off?”

“If it doesn't work, rip it to pieces and make your own.”

She shrugs at his look.

“Alliance engineer motto.”

It's hard to tell what's grease from the shuttle and what's debris from the fight. She grabs a nearby rag and scrubs at her face, flaking the dirt away, slowly revealing her pale skin.

“I thought you'd want to talk. After everything.”

She looks up sharply, hand moving down to clean her neck.

“After what? Vasir? We had to kill her.”

“I know. So will the Council.”

“Good for them.”

Now she peels back the undersuit, working the fabric loose where it's glued by medi-gel, sighing and wincing.

“What did she say to you? At the end?”

“Nothing,” she says quickly. “Just that same justifying bullshit. Nothing important.”

“Say it again. I might believe it the third time.”

She glares, drawing her legs up, tossing aside the dirty rag.

“She tried to hit me on Cerberus, okay? On who they are, what they've done. Why I'm with them.”

Her focus is on her own feet, chin balanced on her knees, hands locked around her ankles.

“That is something we need to consider,” he says carefully. “Now that we know.”

“We don't know anything,” Shepard mutters.

“Jane...”

He reaches for her—a mistake, as she launches herself to her feet and staggers away, back turned.

“We have a job to finish, Garrus. We don't have time for my—”

She turns enough to show a sneer.

“ _Issues_ ,” she finishes with disgust. “Go back to Liara. She likes to share.”

She ducks into the Kodiak and closes the door. So he does as ordered, stumbling his way back into the main chamber. Tali sits cross-legged where he left her, shotgun barrel resting on one knee, as she grinds at something in the thermal clip port. Feron has joined Liara at the console.

The desire to hit something is sudden and strong.

“I'm going to sweep the perimeter,” he says, not quite loud enough to be certain anyone heard, and stomps out.

He retraces their steps to the hull, climbs out on top of the door, locks his mag-boots, and takes potshots at the array of capacitors. He's facing the front blast shields, so the sun blinds him, but he doesn't care about accuracy.

The reserve of thermal clips dries up fast, but he keeps firing, swapping out each weapon until they're all empty, and he's just standing there, breathing hard, still unwaveringly furious.

Stupid. _So_ stupid. He couldn't solve his own problems—how can he ever expect to help her? And she doesn't want his help, either, and had barely needed him for this run. Doesn't need him for anything at all, as she's made clear, not the way _he_ needs her, at the least.

He'd ignored his own advice to Joker and Tali: only whatever Shepard tells them, even if they have to draw it out, like pulling plates from skin. But Shepard never tells, not if she doesn't have to, and _that_ is the problem. She needs help, even if she won't say, even if she's too busy or proud or broken to ask.

So his advice was only meant for them—he _will_ be Shepard's back. If she throws herself into fighting, into the job, then he'll shore her up, take care of her, keep everything else together.

It's not a plan, exactly, but it spurs him to return to the main room, where Liara and Feron still stand at the vid screens. She jumps a little when Garrus touches her shoulder, but then turns to him with a smile.

“So, how's it going, Shadow Broker?”

“I'm not sure I'm ready for anyone to call me that.”

She frowns, rubbing her forearms.

“I'm not sure about any of this. But I had to do it.”

There's something a little pleading in her voice, so he nods. She isn't really interested in what he thinks, just seeking validation. It's what he's best at.

“With this network, with this power, I can...I can give Shepard—”

Her voice hitches, and she trails off, covering her face. Garrus steps forward a bit, awkwardly patting her shoulder.

“I'm sorry,” Liara says, almost broken. “It's over. It's finally...after two years...”

The tears spill over, and she pushes herself into his embrace. Feron looks between them, awkwardly.

“I suppose I'll go check the power supplies,” he says, and hobbles away as quickly as he can manage.

“It's alright,” Garrus says, when he's out of earshot. “At least it's over now.”

“I can't believe we did it.”

She calms and lets him go after a few minutes, wiping her face and refocusing on the console.

“It's incredible. No safeguards or user restrictions. Like he never anticipated anyone but himself being here. And now it's all ours.”

“So where are you going to start?”

Liara smiles, hands spread out above the interface.

“Everywhere.”

And she laughs at her own joke, quietly.

“But I suppose I should start with the Collectors.”

He nods.

“Listen, I need a favor. For Shepard.”

“Anything. I owe you all so much.”

“Could you look into Project Lazarus as well?”

She raises an eyebrow.

“Am I looking for anything specific?”

“You'll know,” he grimaces, “when you see it.”


	8. Seven

** Seven **

For almost three days, she doesn't dream and begins to think she might be free. But then, on the shuttle back from Hagalaz, she falls asleep despite the jostling, head and helmet cradled in a corner. She finds herself on Akuze and bites back a scream.

It's the first day, the first few minutes after touchdown. They've landed in a natural basin, hills rolling up the horizon on every side. She takes the opposite end of a crate from Toombs, who teases her about her size, about her new stripe, about the way she blushes aside his compliments.

“Big leagues now, Shepard,” he says, close enough to pretend he's examining her visor. “Think you can measure up to us?”

“You don't know me,” she replies, pushing against his shoulders. And that's how it started, she used to think, but the dream reminds her it starts a little later, when her back's against that crate and Toombs is kissing his way between her thighs.

She's not superstitious enough to think it was the sex that did them in—but it doesn't help, though, as he pushes her away from the second spray of acid, catching a little on his hands. She's busy screaming, rolling on the sand, trying to peel the melting ceramic from where her skin should be.

He's too scared to think like an officer and so is she, every few seconds assaulted by that unnatural roar and their squad's answering cries. Toombs pulls her out of the sand, dropping his rifle, running for both of them back to the vehicles.

“Stay with me, Jane!” he says sharply. “Don't give up! The Alliance is coming!”

It's the use of her name that hits her, more than the wounds, more than the searing emptiness of all her training as it evaporates into the night—even when she's screaming beneath him, it's always _Shepard_ , always _Corporal_ , teasingly. He got slated for Sergeant, he says, just so he wouldn't think he was talking to himself in bed.

Once again, he takes her as far as the Mako, shoves her on its roof, and she's just leaning down to help when he's snatched away into the dark.

She wakes herself and looks around the shuttle, suspicious, but no one's heard, or no one cares. Garrus is focused on the controls, guiding them unsteadily past the relay, while Tali slouches on the opposite bench.

“On approach, Joker,” Garrus says quietly.

“Roger that. Standby for cargo doors.”

Garrus wants to talk again—she just knows it, and so stands right at the door to escape as soon as possible. She nods aside the crew's deference, marching quickly through to the elevator, which opens on Miranda's nervous face.

“Commander,” she says.

“Don't salute. You're not military.”

“I-I apologize, Commander. I didn't mean—”

“What do you want?”

She gives no ground, barreling into the elevator and activating the code for her cabin. Miranda steps away from the wall, ducking Shepard's cold gaze. She concentrates, eyes narrowed, mouth pressed in a further frown than usual. Her hatred might suffocate them.

“It's the Illusive Man, Commander. He wishes to speak to you.”

The door opens, and Shepard steps out, stripping off her gloves and gauntlets. She won't invite Miranda but suspects she will follow, and she does, timidly, datapad held before her like a shield.

“ _To_ me? He can send a message, if it's that important.”

Chest-plate next, and then wriggling from the straps of the shield harness, unlatching her greaves and yanking her feet one by one from her boots. She lets each piece clatter to the floor, a trail from the door to the fish tank to the desk.

“He wants to talk face-to-face.”

“About the surveillance, right?”

“I didn't tell him,” Miranda says through the bathroom door, louder towards the end as Shepard turns on the faucet and steps beneath the spray. The water escaping into the drain is almost mud. “Shepard, I swear I—”

“Was there anything else, or are you done?”

Shepard works her fingers slowly through her matted hair, coating one palm in soap and massaging her scalp. Her nails are long enough to scratch, and she winces, accidentally finding a few new scrapes and cuts. The water goes briefly pinkish-red, the soap seeking out every hole in her skin and sinking in with little crackles of pain.

She assumes Miranda has left by her silence and is surprised to see her as she leaves the bathroom, still standing near the wall, feet together, eyes respectfully averted.

“Go ahead and look,” Shepard snarls, surprising herself. “It's more yours than mine, anyway.”

Miranda's face flushes red, eyes quickly darting up Shepard's form, pausing at her knees, her belly, her breasts, and finally meeting her eyes. She swallows and steps forward, but Shepard steps past her, trickling water behind.

“Shepard, I—I want to apologize—”

“I want you to think,” Shepard says, tapping out a selection at the dresser's display, “every time you speak to me, how very lucky you are that I haven't cut your throat yet.”

That shuts her up—Shepard hears the breath leave Miranda in a panicked rush, and simply carries on getting dressed, stepping carefully into her underwear, squeezing excess water from her hair to the floor. Miranda just as quickly resumes stealing her oxygen, but remains unmoved.

“If you have nothing else to say, get out.”

Shepard listens to the door slide open and closed, the elevator descend, and then the quiet gurgle of the fish tank. The fish are dead again—she'll have to say something to Kelly, which means leaving this room, which means she'll need to wear something more.

The dresser's doors swing open, revealing stacks of identical, neatly-arranged fatigues, separated by color and purpose. Kasumi's gift—that awkward leather cocktail dress—has shifted from a bunched pile by her boots to a hanger between pairs of pressed trousers. The heels, blocky, awkward, _ugly_ , are tucked into a corner.

The dresser has a suggestion: automatically pulling a shirt, trousers, boots, some unnecessary buckles and straps. She shakes out the fold, twisting the shirt in her hands, running the fabric between her fingers. A scab on her knuckle catches something, and she turns the sleeve over to see.

Cerberus's logo, the orange arms devouring, a beetle from above. The stitches are raised there, almost thick as twine, synthetic order of needle in and out, looping thread, picking up, looping back. She runs a nail in the seam, slowly.

She feels a little cheated. Time did not bring relief, and neither did empathy—she feels their eyes more than ever, with the Illusive Man's gouged out. Garrus wants to talk, _always_ , about everything. She almost wishes she'd let him take the shot—if Sidonis was dead, if he was busy blaming himself, she'd be free of his attention.

There's a sudden noise, a cold quick sound of ripping. She looks down and sees she's torn the sleeve clean off. She keeps going, stomach clenching, separating each panel, arranging the pieces by size on her bed. These aren't her clothes, so she works through the whole, pulling every one apart as her skin and hair slowly dry. She creates a snowstorm of loose threads and lint until all that's left is Kasumi's dress.

It creaks and groans over her hips, but it's loose at the shoulders and tight across her heavy breasts. They're larger than she remembers, and as she studies her profile, she can see now how they sit a little lower as well. She closes the metal clasp at her neck and slips into those ugly shoes. Her skin is almost ghost-white, the edges of each sleeve a stark line of demarcation, the borders of unknown regions on a map. Like a doll, ball-jointed, waiting to pose.

“The Illusive Man is waiting for you in the debriefing room, Commander,” Kelly says without a glance, the second Shepard steps off the elevator. The crewman on watch stares, wide-eyed, as Shepard combs her fingers through her hair, arranging the ends along her chin.

“Understood. What's our course?”

“Drifting, ma'am. We're scanning Erinle at the moment.”

“Wrap it up. When I'm done with the Illusive Man, we're moving on.”

She seems surprised at the direction, and even more so at Shepard's attire.

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Alert the helmsman. I shouldn't be more than a few minutes.”

The Illusive Man's sitting, one foot balanced on opposite knee, hand rubbing his brow, a collection of five cigarettes already wilting in the ash tray.

“I don't appreciate being kept waiting, Commander.”

“Then leave a message next time. I was busy.”

“You dropped off-grid.”

“Helping a friend,” she says shortly. “So, do you need something specific, or is this about the cameras?”

She can almost relish in the tiniest bit of shock that twitches across his mouth, and steps forward.

“Let's be honest with each other, for once. You don't need to know what color Kasumi's pajamas are, or how many times Zaeed takes a piss after a mission, or what cards Tali's hiding in her suit during poker. You don't need eyes on my ship, and I don't need to be watched.”

The blood rushing past her ears drowns his reply, and she turns and marches off the pad, fists clenched. Mordin gives her a little smile as she exits, barreled along by the adrenaline. Joker's leaning against her terminal, talking quietly with Kelly.

“Nice threads, Commander,” he says. “Really compliments the whole hermit thing you've been brewing.”

“Get back to work. We're heading for Omega. Chambers, call Samara up.”

Murdering Morinth is almost liberating. A night of pretending to be someone else, working the crowd and the asari and herself. The idea of letting go? Intoxicating—she slides into Morinth's lap, happy to relinquish, happy not to think of the plan or what's waiting back on the ship.

Here is someone who never knew her, who hasn't been enamored with an archived avatar or an overly perfected memory—who doesn't see where the dents and scratches are supposed to be, who touches skin that was never smooth and doesn't flinch, whose hand works its way up her thigh slowly.

She's never kissed a woman—hadn't considered it, hadn't been presented the opportunity, and Morinth tastes familiar, like alcohol and metal. They're both after more than the kill, so it goes on longer than either had intended.

The snap of Morinth's neck ricochets through Shepard's arm, ending at her bare, heaving shoulders.

“I'm sorry,” she says to Samara. “I couldn't wait for you any longer.”

Samara understands, but would rather be alone with the corpse, so Shepard stumbles back onto the street and hails a cab.

“Where to?” the driver says, already bored, and she has to think about it. Aria will want a report, maybe, or a chance to show inappropriate gratitude.

Blood still buzzing, tongue thick in her mouth, Shepard hears herself say, “Afterlife.”

She's not ready to not be someone else, not ready to go back and be something less. The floor and her uneven shoes tilt her towards the bar, where she accepts a drink from a man leaning against the far end.

“That means he's going to come talk to you,” the bartender warns, but she shrugs, running her finger around the rim of the glass. She doesn't look up again, because she doesn't want to see more of him than she has to: dark hair, dark brows, square jaw, and mouth pulled into a slight frown. Close. Close enough. The heat of him assaults her, his sleeve sliding against her bare arm.

She muffles him with her lips, allowing him to lead her into a back room, pull her onto his lap in a dark corner. The couch is sticky—she grimaces into his slimy kiss, redirecting his hands to her hips. He pulls his face away with a triumphant whine.

“Fuck, baby, I've never seen a woman like you here.”

Shepard goes completely still.

“Don't talk,” she says, filled with furious calm. His voice is too high-pitched, too breathy. In the dark, in silence, he could be exactly who she wants, exactly where she wants and when. The calluses of his hands could be from console repair and weapon maintenance—the roughness of his sleeves starched to military stiffness. She could be curling into Kaidan's lap, ducking discovery at some boring Alliance function, stealing just a few more minutes to themselves.

“Aw, c'mon, what's a hook-up without a few dirty words between strangers?”

Until he opens his mouth and removes all doubt.

“I said _don't talk_ ,” Shepard snarls, making to stand, but one hand closes over her wrist.

“I'm not done yet,” he says, cold, flexing his grip, until the barrel of her pistol is resting between his eyes.

“I am.”

She walks back to the _Normandy_ in carefully measured steps, eyes averted, dodging any deference. Kelly works her station, even this late, barely glancing up to deliver her news.

“Commander, you have a new message at your private terminal.”

A pointedly polite directive, straight from the Illusive Man.

“Project Overlord,” Shepard reads aloud, bemused.


	9. Eight

** Eight **

As it turns out, archeology isn't adequate preparation for sifting through all the collected knowledge of the galaxy. To say Liara is overwhelmed is a dramatic understatement—her messages consist mostly of exclamation points and illegible key mashing.

“I don't know what to tell you,” Garrus says. “Weren't you an information broker for two years?”

“Not quite. And it was nothing like this, Garrus.”

“Whining won't resolve the organization,” Tali mutters, too quiet to be heard over the channel.

“Did you find anything about Project Lazarus?” Joker asks.

“Yes, _everything_. Apparently, one of the techs was a mole. I have Feron sifting through the data.”

“Feron?”

“He's reliable, Garrus. I trust him.”

“I _don't_ ,” Garrus snaps. “Neither does Shepard.”

Joker's cool gaze centers on him.

“He's the only operative I have,” Liara says.

“This isn't something everyone in the galaxy should know.”

“No, just the four of us,” Joker says. “And Miranda. And Jack. And Chakwas.”

“What exactly is your problem?”

“I just wasn't aware you were the designated speaker.”

Garrus glowers at Joker.

“I know Shepard.”

“So do I,” Joker says. “And yet none of us saw this coming, and none of us knew what to do when it happened, and none of us know what to say to her now. So let's just stop pretending we have a window to her soul, okay?”

“Don't fight,” Tali warns, stepping between them. “Joker's right. We don't know what Shepard wants us to look for, if anything, or what we can do when we actually find something. We _do_ know we're supposed to be doing, what we were brought here to do.”

“So we'll make a fucking to-do list,” Joker sighs, and the door to the battery snaps open behind them. Shepard glances around the surprised assembly with a blank look.

“We've got a job,” she says.

“What the hell are you wearing?”

“Clothes. Close the channel. We have business.”

Garrus hangs up on Liara with a shrug.

“Cerberus cell went off-grid. We need to investigate,” Shepard says shortly. “Joker, set a course for the Typhon system.”

“Aye, aye, ma'am.”

“Suit up,” she says to Garrus and Tali. “It's something about experimental technology. Could be weapons, could be mechs.”

It's worse than either of those, of course. Geth, around every corner, but not what they've fought before: puppets of some horrifying VI, shrieking and glowing green. The landing zone holds only corpses, and the apocalyptic logs of one traumatized director.

“D'you think every Cerberus proposal just starts with the words _we probably shouldn't do this, but..._?”

“Quiet,” Shepard says. “This isn't vaudeville, Garrus.”

“What is vaudeville?”

He wants to guess, but she isn't playing. The director gives them vague instructions of extreme urgency, first to retract the dish, then to blow it up, and Shepard moves cautiously from column to column. Escaping the dish as it collapses around them isn't even fun, but helping Shepard corner the director in his safe room almost is.

“You know, it's getting harder for me to believe the party line,” Shepard tells the director, a cowering man named Gavin Archer, who eyes her unholstered pistol nervously.

“I assure you, we _never_ intended for any of this to happen. We had safety protocols, but it all just got out of hand.”

“It usually does,” she says. “Now how do we fix it?”

 _We_ don't fix anything, it turns out: the director gives them more instructions and then folds back up into his chair. Shepard picks Vulcan station first—not that Garrus complains. Stepping onto a disabled geth ship will require a little more mental preparation than retaking a power station.

Rivers of lava are about as easy as he'd hoped, and there's little challenge for them in cutting down the station's supply of LOKIs and YMIRs. It's so much like three years ago—he can close his eyes and pretend it's Feros or Therum or Solcrum, pretend there's only the familiar stutter and squawk of the platforms, instead of that unearthly scream chasing them back to the Hammerhead. One override lifted, one to go.

“It's saying something,” Shepard mutters, hand rubbing the back of her neck. He's driving now, and has to twist in the seat to look at her. “Don't you think? It's trying to tell us something.”

“Geographic conditions indicate an aesthetically pleasing view nearby. Organic lifeforms may wish to take note.”

Garrus stares at the console, a mixture of numb shock and confusion, and Shepard breaks into shaky, nervous chuckles.

“I'm sure it's just feedback,” Tali says, but she doesn't sound convinced. They ford a river, swooping between chunks of debris bigger than the tank. Archer relays salient details over the channel.

“Our people there have gone silent. It's likely the VI has activated the defense shields to keep you out. Good lu—”

The VI growls, cutting him off.

“Yeah,” Tali says. “It's _likely_.”

She works the cannon, cursing through the fight against the geth turret, while Shepard assists at the console, shoring up the sabotage protocols.

The turret takes much longer to defeat than Garrus had hoped, but a glancing blow from one of its beams rips a hole in the Hammerhead's port side, big enough for a krogan to fall through, and they spend a hour on the defensive. Hold position long enough for the turret to get a lock, then boost across the field before it fires, hit it when its shield goes down. It's not the most elegant of strategies, but it's gratifying, invigorating even, to be absorbed in combat once again, to be part of a synchronized team.

Even Shepard seems to agree: grinning at the turret's defeat, dropping through the hole when they've landed and pawing at the crates stacked beside the door.

“Platinum sheeting. It'll be an easy repair. Just keep your safety harnesses on, and we should be fine.”

A geth prime hovers in stasis just inside the door.

“That...doesn't inspire confidence.”

“Let's keep moving,” Shepard says, haltingly.

They keep up an atmosphere of jocularity, forced laughter and lame jokes, as they crawl through the empty ship.

Empty—Garrus scowls, _empty_ is wrong, is the wrong word for what this ship is: it's waiting. He's never felt so watched, so followed from room to room. The VI doesn't scream in here, just opens and closes doors around them, shuffling servers, activating dormant logs, a pair of leering green eyes that fade from the glass as they walk by.

And that _music_. Just like Hermes, the tram station with its corpses, waiting for them in arranged chairs.

“In an effort to reduce workplace stress,” the overhead assures them.

“You know, I think this was creepy _before_ the VI took over,” Tali says quietly. “Who would find this racket appealing?”

“Cerberus,” Shepard says, because that is the answer to everything here. “C'mon, we've got to be close.”

They are: through the next sunken corridor is what he guesses must have been storage for the mobile platforms, half-submerged. The water is cold and somehow slimy, soaking through his boots and into the cracks of his carapace. A puzzle of floor pieces hinders them momentarily, the kind of crap Shepard loves solving.

“This was too easy,” she warns, lifting the final override, and he's almost angry with her for calling it: the ship explodes with howling around them. The VI chases them back through collapsing corridors, and there's no tactics at all—they run blindly, stopping to fire only when they have no choice.

The prime at the entrance, awake now and furious, overwhelms them momentarily, but they push through, peppering it to destruction with pistol fire, emerging through the door and onto the landing platform, empty of their previous triumph. They climb into the Hammerhead, shaky, quiet, and Garrus steers them away from Prometheus.

“Atlas should be open to you now,” Archer says over the channel. “I'll try to meet you there.”

“Don't put yourself out too much, doctor,” Shepard says, too numb to achieve annoyance.

Her face is nearly grey, skin dull, tight and swollen around her eyes. They've been planetside almost twelve hours now, Garrus realizes, without a chance for rest. She catches his stare and offers a small half-smile.

“Watch the road,” she says. “There's a lot of sudden drops around here.”

“Sure you're up for this?”

“Let's get it over with. Then we can move on to the next thing.”

“And the next thing,” Tali adds ruefully.

Atlas is quieter than Prometheus but so much worse for it. No more screaming, no music stuttering through broken speakers, no quiet clattering behind dark windows. Every footstep echoes. The VI teases them, playing a shell game with the opening doors.

“Why is it leading us?” Tali asks. “Does it...does it want to be shut down?”

Maybe, but not without a fight: the elevators try to crush them, the door consoles go wandering off, and the VI creates a logic problem of basic controls. The server room opens, and they step inside with weapons drawn, checking the corners.

“Okay,” Shepard sighs, seeing the room clear. “Get ready. I wouldn't be surprised if this button summons a Reaper.”

She slams her closed fist down, and nothing happens.

“Well,” Garrus says, “that was—”

Shepard interrupts him with a scream, dropping to her knees, convulsing, green fire running from her omnitool to her eyes.

“Shepard!”

She staggers to her feet, holding up one hand, the other twisting against her chest-plate.

“I...I'm—”

Another scream, but not hers. Something opens her mouth, forces out air, shoves her to the door, and then slams it shut behind her.

“No!”

Garrus throws himself against the door with a shout, breaking the tips of his talons on the seam. Tali takes the practical route, quickly calling up a battery of sabotage and hacks.

“Shepard, don't move! We're coming for you!”

It's useless. They can hear the echo of her walking away, of gunfire, of electronic screams. They can't reach Archer or anyone else over the comm. Tali's hacking is good, but the VI is much better. Eventually, she joins him on the floor, releasing a cry of frustration.

“She'll be okay,” he says, after the lights go out. “She can do this.”

The server room swarms to life beyond the window, but the glass is unbreakable, and all they can do is watch the ballet of light consume the walls. He'd give anything to hear something, even if it's just the scream again, even if it's hers. The server lights make a lake of Tali's face as she reaches for his hand.

He doesn't want to know how long it takes until the door opens, but it does, unsealing enough that he can force an arm through. The lights return, but only as a soft emergency red.

“Keep to my six,” Garrus says. “I don't hear anything, but that doesn't mean it's not there.”

The windows into the central chamber are too dark for them to see inside, but they follow the scorch marks and bullet-holes down the corridor and through two labs, to a waiting elevator.

“Flashlights,” Garrus says when they reach the chamber, and they hold the beams together, steadily working from one wall to the other.

Gavin Archer, or what's left of him, lies in a pool of blood beneath his brother's dead body.

“Keelah,” Tali whispers. “What did they do?”

Garrus sweeps his light over the machine, the supports, landing on a discarded pistol.

“Shepard?”

A small whimper is his only answer, the sort of quiet noise a cornered animal might make, wounded and waiting for the kill.

“Shepard?”

She is pressed between two columns, knees drawn to her chest, eyes wide and empty. She flinches and scrambles away from their approach.

“Don't—don't come near me! Just stay there!”

She refuses medical attention, refuses even to speak again, and on the shuttle back, when he tries to touch her shoulder, she dodges, slamming herself against the door. She almost falls when they land, shoving aside the crew's deference and launching into the elevator.

“Should we follow?” Tali asks uncertainly.

But there's no need—Shepard reemerges minutes later, shedding pieces of armor like dead petals, followed close by Miranda.

“Commander, wait. What happened?”

Shepard stops at the contact, staring at Miranda's fingers wrapped loosely around her shoulder.

“Get your hand off me,” she says, very calm and very quiet.

“Commander, please—”

He sees it happen a split-second before it actually does.

Shepard wraps her hand around Miranda's wrist, twists her arm back, and snaps the palm of her hand into the point of Miranda's extended elbow. The crack is almost deafening—Miranda drops with a cry, forearm swinging limp. Garrus steps forward and hears himself shout, but Shepard whirls into the Kodiak, fires two shots into the controls, and blasts the deck on take-off.


	10. Nine

** Nine **

She thinks of practicality, after the fact. Disabling the blackbox was a necessity—without the IFF, without any identifying signal, she can't be so easily followed. Maybe Cerberus was counting on that, though, tying navigation control to it. She makes it out of the system and then drifts, uncertain of the next step.

No food, no water—just the undersuit, her boots, and a pistol. A passing merchant freighter spots her on ladar, and she trades the shuttle for passage.

“Accident,” she explains to the captain, who exchanges a fast appraising glance with his first mate. “Just trying to get home.”

The captain comes at her in the middle of the night, but she isn't asleep and breaks his jaw. The rest of the crew is just as hungry but not nearly as stupid, and she hacks the environmental controls, using the threat of depressurization to keep them in line. She changes transports at the fuel depot—choosing a converted turian cruiser, some kind of scientific vessel, headed back to Council Space by way of Omega, for charting or something.

She can access her accounts now, and withdraws enough to buy a coat and different shoes from the depot's downtrodden service workers. The turians' captain takes just enough to overcome his fear of inspectors, and she settles herself between crates in the cargo-hold.

Civilian travel is slow but steady. She reaches Omega in a week.

She ducks inspection at the docks, sliding between the guards and an oddly cooperative pack of vorcha.

A batarian stands just on the other side of the door, perched on a slowly collapsing box, gesticulating at the crowds.

“Repent!” he demands. “The end is nigh!”

He stands with his arms outstretched, head back, and there's a flash of neon that washes the color from his face and clothes. He is bright-white, suspended by wires and tubes, haloed in green and orange, wild eyes seeking hers.

“Quiet, please,” she whispers. “Make it stop.”

The emptiness of David Archer prickles beneath her skin, and she steers clear of Afterlife, of Gozu District, of any members of Aria's guard who've seen her face before. Kima District's a gamble, but safe enough—someone else owns Archangel's building now, having cleared it of blood and bodies. All she needs are its markets, for their size and selection.

She starts simple: a Phalanx, a Mattock, an easily concealed shield generator, an off-market Logic Arrest omnitool. Cerberus's gifts find their way into various bins, but she can't let go of the Kassa Locust, strapping it in her shoulder harness, pulling the tattered coat protectively over her new purchases.

She finds the garment district, and chooses a stall staffed by a quarian woman, who is puttering around behind the counter, folding lengths of brightly colored silk and cutting with a pair of shears longer than her arm.

“Please, feel free to look!” she says, substituting for a smile with wide-stretched arms. “Don't mind Vrall—he's just the help.”

The vorcha hisses at her.

“I am Rala'Tor vas Omega,” the shopkeeper continues, neatly slicing a section of fabric. “Mostly I sell the bolts, but I sew, as you can see. I don't get many human customers, though I relish a challenge.”

Shepard's barely listening but nods at the pauses between the woman's words, plunging her hands into the cloth draped across the table, covering her colorless skin in greens and purples and reds. The vorcha hisses again and makes to grab her elbow.

“No touching!”

“It's alright, Vrall. She won't hurt anything.”

Rala turns her head to Shepard, tilted in questioning.

“Will you?”

Shepard draws a pinch of orange silk over her healing knuckles.

“No, of course not.”

Rala carries on in silence, snipping fabric, then turning to pin it to a vaguely turian-shaped mannequin, checking the pattern against her vidscreen. Vrall glances between them, hand tightening on his pistol's grip, as Shepard twines and twists and drapes different swatches over her arm.

“That particular pattern is based on some popular aquatic designs. Khelish symbols associated with the afterlife.”

Shepard holds up a stretch of deep blue, sprinkled through with waves and dots of dull gold.

“I've heard lots of cultures associate large bodies of water with death and what comes after—the drell, the hanar, even your own people—we're not different. Our ancestors, when we were trapped on a planet instead of a fleet, believed the souls of the departed dispersed into the water, and when we drank, we absorbed their wisdom, their experience, even their beauty.”

Rala laughs, quietly, and returns to her pinning.

Shepard looks back at the fabric, running its edge against her skin. Blue and gold—Mom used to joke she was born that way, faded, and spent the rest of her life trying to get back. She's spent so much time in uniform, of some sort. Even her shore leave was always spent in fatigues.

She glances down at her dirty undersuit. There's a spot of dried blood on her belly. She considers wiping at it, but Rala is watching her, reaching beneath the table, producing a small mirror.

“A test,” she says, still smiling, and gestures for Shepard to lift the fabric, to hold it up to her face.

“Is...is this me?”

There's a crack in the mirror—it falls across her mouth in the reflection, diagonal, near the corner.

“I think it is,” Rala says warmly. “And I know just what to do with you.”

She works fast, measuring, cutting, aligning, sewing, everything in a few hours. She shows Shepard into a small curtained-off room behind her stall.

“Don't mind the mess,” she says. “I'm not much for entertaining.”

Omega's dirty heat blasts Shepard's skin as she peels off the suit and steps out of the shoes. Rala trades her, passing the new clothes from the other side of the curtain.

“Mass-produced,” she sniffs. “You can tell, the way it wears on you. If you don't mind me saying. Your left foot looked a little swollen. And those shoulders. Military's the height of fad at the moment, though.”

The new fabric runs smooth over her skin.

“There's no appreciation for craft now,” Rala says, and Shepard can hear the suit stretching in her hands. “You humans, all your beautiful coloring. Satisfied with the same ten colors, the same six styles. Such conformity. Ridiculous. Not everyone need look like the asari.”

The zipper's teeth click over her navel, and Rala chuckles to herself.

“Sorry. Showing a bit of my bigotry there, I suppose. How's it fitting?”

Shepard surveys herself in the larger mirror before stepping out.

“This is me,” she says, enveloped by the heat.

Rala promises more, with time, so Shepard gives her two days and guesses at the credits. Rala's humbled, bowing and scraping, so it must be enough.

She finds better shoes at a batarian stall of Rala's suggestion, soft boots with laces to her knees, hard-soled but pliable, meant for a traveler, or so the merchant tells her.

“You look like a traveler.”

“I could be,” Shepard says. “I am.”

A cab drops her outside what used to be Morinth's building—that apartment's been rented out as well, lights on and figures visible on the balcony. She looks up but can't make out the faces.

She could belong here now, or at least her clothes could. Women wandering up and down the street behind her move differently, posture loose, heads tilted, eyes roving casually across the buildings and each other. Her training is too deeply ingrained to be given up, but she tries at least, calling up the woman who curled sinuously into Morinth's lap before snapping her neck.

She tries to inhabit that woman, to force those thoughts and memories into her uncooperative limbs. But there's none of the liberation she wants, just a dull ache behind her eyes. Shepard pulls the hood of her new silk jacket over her hair and walks back to her rented room, hand curled around the unfamiliar weight of her pistol.

An assumed name is not enough, apparently, to protect her: a batarian and a turian in Aria's colors wait at the boardinghouse's front doors, and they fall in when she passes, brushing her elbows with each step. The asari herself is inside, lounging on Shepard's cot.

“I don't mind squatters, for the most part,” Aria says. “And you've always provided the proper tribute. But let's be honest. Things tend to get.. _tense_ around you.”

Shepard balances her weight on both feet.

“Still angry about Patriarch, then?”

Aria smiles cruelly and shrugs.

“A little. But that's not my main concern. You're missing a few pieces, Commander.”

She gestures for Shepard to sit.

“I don't know what you mean,” Shepard says carefully, remaining upright, too stiff to move.

“Of course you do. You've slipped the leash, which I'll admit, I do admire. But I don't want trouble from the Illusive Man.”

Aria smoothes her hands down her shirt.

“We have arrangements. I'd rather you weren't around to fuck them up.”

No hiding, then. Shepard looks at her feet, at the black boots, the grey trousers, the blue-and-gold hem of her jacket, the white edge of her rough vest. It's not quite who she is, not enough to save her from what she was.

“This isn't an eviction. Or, at least, it doesn't have to be.”

“A few days,” Shepard chokes out.

“Getting your affairs in order?”

“Something like it.”

Aria smiles again, bringing her hands together over her crossed knees.

“Okay. I like you, Shepard. Not really sure why. You have the potential to be a pain in my ass, but you can have three days. I won't give you up, but I won't protect you from inquiries.”

“Fair enough.”

It isn't fair—nothing is anymore. She closes the door behind Aria and her henchmen, and leans into it, face flushed with heat. She presses her lips together and tries not to scream.

The manager doesn't even look up when she leaves, somehow trusting that she hasn't left any corpses to surprise the cleaners. All she has is what she's wearing.

There's no set standard for days on the station, everyone running their own schedule, so the markets are always open, always teeming with filth and population. Someone's decided that it's mealtime, anyway, and a few other stalls follow suit, throwing up canopies, frying meat in massive pans over poorly-controlled fires. It's a Blue Suns market, and blue cloth means dextro, so Shepard keeps an eye out for orange—batarians and the occasional asari slaving over cauldrons of grey levo slop.

Shepard finds one towards the middle, with a plump asari proprietor, and perches at the counter between two wordless batarians.

“A few more minutes,” the asari says, waving away her customers' impatience. “You want to eat, or taste metal for a week?”

“Hardly a difference, _your_ cooking,” one of the batarians grunts, but goes back to his omnitool without further fuss. The asari rolls her eyes and lugs her cauldron off the fire.

“Sweetheart, you can't sit in Mommy's way.”

She's speaking to a little blue girl, half-tucked beneath the counter, playing with a pair of krogan figurines. Shepard watches the girl scoot out into the light, latching on to her mother's knee.

“Hungry, Mama,” she says.

“I know, baby. Just a minute.”

The asari moves around her as she ladles out servings. Shepard holds out her credit chit and accepts her portion, eyes on the child. Bored, the girl smashes her figurines together in mock battle, then tosses them aside with a huff, then crosses her pudgy arms and stares into the face of each customer.

“Mama,” she says loudly, pointing at Shepard. “Is that a human?”

The asari throws Shepard an apologetic look.

“Yes, sweetie, this nice lady is human.”

“You look like me,” the little girl says to Shepard, clambering up a stack of crates to eye-level.

“Do I?”

The girl reaches out, hand brushing back the hood. Her fingers twine into Shepard's messy hair, tugging. The asari gives a little cry of shock and pulls her daughter way.

“Goddess, I'm so sorry! She's at that inquisitive stage. You know kids.”

 _No,_ she wants to say, _I don't know at all._

“It's okay. I don't mind.”

Shepard twists the spoon around her bowl, tongue thick around her words.

“How old is she?”

The asari glances down at her daughter, attached now to her skirt by tiny, dirty fists.

“Ten years. But it seems like just yesterday her daddy walked out on my pregnant ass. Everyone wants the maiden, not the matron.”

She smiles at Shepard, small and ugly, and reverses the question politely.

“You got any?”

“Yes,” Shepard hears herself say. “A son.”

“Oh,” the asari says, with the same polite indifference. “How old?”

Shepard leaves the stew half-finished and wanders, scanning the crowd for families. She's no stranger to station-living, and she sees the ghost of herself in the children she passes, waiting in a cruiser's chow line on her dad's shoulders, passing hand to hand between unfamiliar officers and friends.

A turian woman and a human man wait at the cabstand ahead of her, a turian toddler swinging from their outstretched arms. There's something alarming in their domesticity, and Shepard slides behind a column, watching, reading the man's posture. Broad shoulders, wiry build, a shock of gold hair, and a laugh that carries through the open air. She catches a glimpse of his profile—the same straight nose and wide cheekbones—and then the woman calls him _Zack_ and her heart stops.

Shepard falls back, pushing herself into the darkness, but then he turns—it's not Toombs, the eyes and mouth and jaw all wrong. All the same, she waits out the next three cabs.

She finds an open public terminal near one of the transport stations, ten minutes before her shuttle is scheduled to leave. The seat looks no cleaner than its fellows, so she's reluctant to sit, standing instead to the side and tapping in her pass-code. It's likely Cerberus has put a tracer on her account, but she's never been very good at stealth.

There is only one message, looked to be sent from herself, but it's not—something is off in the encryption, creating a jumble of code interlaced with the message she'd sent weeks ago. Only one line remains intact, followed by a backslash and the letter _K_.

 _Let me find you_ , it says.


	11. Ten

** Ten **

“I got a ping on Omega. Just a few minutes ago.”

“ _Omega_?” Joker repeats. “What the hell is she doing there?”

They'd found the shuttle a few days ago, blasted for scrap and drifting just outside the Tassrah fuel depot. None of the attendants would cop to seeing her, however, not even the hunched old man with his feet stuffed into her boots.

“No women,” he insisted. “No new women for years. These are _my_ boots. Fuck off.”

They conduct the search from the main battery—a _schlep_ , Joker complains, but necessary to maintain the illusion of safety. There were no other witnesses to Shepard's sudden exit, but Miranda's broken arm starts a few rumors Garrus has difficulty stomping out. This is supposed to be a galaxy-saving mission, after all, not some goddamn pleasure cruise, as Zaeed helpfully reminded him only this morning.

“I'm not opposed,” he had said. “Just lookin' at the state of things. There's a bit of restlessness.”

“You have a suggestion?”

He did: a lead from an old contact inside the Blue Suns, to an extortion racket targeting miners and merchants in the Rosetta Nebula.

“Hang on,” Liara frowns, drawing Garrus from the memory. “Looks like she's sent a reply.”

“This feels wrong,” Tali says quietly. “We shouldn't be spying on her like this.”

“You have any other suggestions for finding her?”

“Maybe she doesn't want to be found.”

“Then why did she use a public terminal?” Garrus demands. “She might not want Cerberus to find her, but she wants us.”

He stops himself at the last second from saying _me_ , but Joker reads the intention in his eyes and scoffs.

“It...it's encrypted,” Liara says. “Not a standard Alliance cypher, or anything I recognize. I could probably crack it, given time.”

“We'll check back in an hour,” Garrus says and hangs up without a goodbye. “Joker, get up top and set a course for Omega.”

“Yes, sir, Commander Vakarian, _sir_.”

“Stow the attitude.”

“Hey, fuck you! No one elected you leader, you just took it, and I'd like to point out you've been doing a pretty shit job so far.”

“Stop fighting!” Tali says, putting herself between them. “This isn't helping.”

“None of this is helping!” Joker snaps. “We're just running fucking circles, looking for someone who doesn't even exist anymore!”

He shoves off from the rail, clattering his crutches back beneath his arms and swinging through the door.

“But no, I'll go set a fucking course for fucking _Omega_ so we can keep fucking chasing someone who obviously doesn't want our fucking help.”

Garrus follows him out, bristling, ready to keep it going, and is followed himself by Tali. They stop short at the sight of Jack, cross-legged on the table.

“She ran because this isn't who she is anymore,” she says, with a tinge of prepared anxiety, posture stiff. Someone bought her new clothes, and they sit oddly on her frame, bagged and bunched. Jack picks at the hem of her shirt.

“Aren't you supposed to be gone?”

“Massani's finishing up the deal for our transport,” she sighs, drumming her fingers on her kneecaps. “She felt the noose, and she slipped it.”

“What would you know?” Garrus says coldly, plates itching with irritation.

“I know what it's like to run. To realize you have no ground, so you gotta make some of your own.”

Her hands lock over her knees, and she speaks with conviction but has trouble maintaining eye contact.

“You make your own ground. That's all she's doing. Give her time, and she'll come to you.”

“Speaking from experience?” Joker asks.

Jack shrugs.

“I guess. I never had anyone to go to.”

“Eh, girlie, where'd you get off to?”

Zaeed's rough demand echoes, and he appears around the corner.

“No getting off, old man,” Jack says. “This is where we eat.”

“Ship's here. Let's fucking go.”

Everyone unloads at the depot, Zaeed's side project enough to keep at least Jack and Grunt and Kasumi occupied. Thane and Samara are happy to keep an eye on Mordin, who sees a challenge in the depot's disease-ridden populace.

Garrus leaves Tali to the lie.

“We'll rendezvous when Shepard makes contact,” she says. “Keep the emergency channel open. She said she'd be finished in a few days.”

A poor effort, but boredom keeps the questions at bay. Only Jacob and Miranda remain, unwelcome, their driving purpose having fled. They offer assistance once and silently accept their swift rejection.

Tali is sick of them all and heads below deck. Joker's back at the helm, still grumbling, and a few minutes later the ship shudders through the relay. Garrus won't accept Jack's authority on anything, let alone his best friend, growling the memory of her words aside on his return to the battery.

Enclosed spaces aren't good for emotional stability—he'd do better in the cargo bay, with its improvised training space tucked behind where the shuttle should be. But leaving this room runs the risk of encounters he hasn't planned for. The sensation of holding the whole mission together with his bare hands drains him.

“Officer Vakarian, Operative Lawson would like to request a meeting.”

“Just...tell her I'll be over in a minute.”

“That will not be necessary. She is currently waiting outside the battery.”

He opens the door without collecting himself first, too surprised at the intrusion to prepare. Miranda holds one datapad beneath her good arm and another in her hand.

“I hope I'm not interrupting anything.”

“You're not.”

It's unusual to see her in something other than the mandated catsuit, but the splint on her arm requires more loose attire. The borrowed fatigues sit wrong on her frame—she looks as dowdy and sad as a krogan mother.

“I thought you should see this,” she says quietly, holding out the datapad. “The Illusive Man sent it along. For Shepard.”

“What did you tell him?”

“That Shepard refuses to speak to him. That he pushed too far, took her off-mission.”

She hesitates, meeting his eyes briefly.

“ _Nothing_ else.”

He skims the message: _Hawking Eta, Klendagon, defunct weapon_.

“Is there a timeline?”

“They've dropped out of contact. Only a few days, but considering the location...”

“Why tell me?”

Her gaze is quizzical.

“You're the second-in-command,” he continues, handing the datapad back.

“No, I'm not. No one on this ship trusts me. They'd sooner shoot me in the back than follow my orders.”

“So I'm the next best thing?” he laughs coldly. Miranda deflates, slumping against the doorframe.

“I don't have the draw Shepard has, that fire that makes people willing to follow her into hell itself.”

“Hmm,” he says, and Miranda's eyes brighten a bit.

“ _You_ have that. Even before we knew you were Archangel, we admired the way you drew such disparate people to your cause.”

“You knew I was Archangel the whole time,” Garrus says quietly. “No need to pretend now.”

She rubs her brow with her good hand, unwilling or unable to accede, and glances down at her broken arm.

“Look, the Collectors aren't going away. If Shepard proves unsalvageable—”

“She isn't a commodity, Miranda.”

“I know. I made that mistake once.”

“More than once.”

He sighs with her, too tired to keep up the torture. She certainly looks pained enough—none of that swagger, that arrogance that once followed her around like a noxious perfume.

“I'm not the one you owe an apology to,” he says after a silence.

“Where is she?”

“We're not sure.”

She nods and straightens.

“It's likely the Cerberus team is already dead,” she says. “But we need whatever they found. There's still the rest of the galaxy.”

She leaves, and takes along what's left of his anger. Her apologies are for Shepard, but his are for Tali.

“You dialed the wrong channel.”

“I'm sorry.”

“No, you're not,” she says, a little cruel. “You just want to be forgiven.”

He sighs, and she sighs back, mocking.

“Go talk to Liara. She has what you want.”

“I don't want Liara.”

“No, you want Shepard.”

“I want to _help_ Shepard.”

“Of course that's how you see it,” Tali snaps.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Exactly _that_ , Garrus! How can you—?”

She makes an ugly noise of frustration, a litany of curses drowned by static over the channel.

“Go talk to Liara. You have nothing to say to me.”

He's too proud to apologize to Joker and angry again, anyway. If he can't fight it out, he'll work. Efficiency can always improve another tenth of a percentage point, so he climbs over the rail and into the guns.

The order of mechanics soothes him—he imagines the twist of each cog twists a valve within him, releasing pressure through his moving fingers and loosening the stiff hydraulics of his shoulders. This is concrete. This is understandable. He moves and the machine moves in response, no guessing, no assumptions. No need to question or interpret.

An hour passes, then two, then five. There is symmetry, order, peaceful patterns to distract him from the absolute clusterfuck of his life. He will stop only when his body requires it, for food or water or sleep. This is something he cannot screw up—he can find a problem and trace its source, back along the rigid lines and systems, each process leading to one origin, one answer. And solutions will be obvious, based on fact and logic, a series of options he can steadily test and then eliminate as they fail.

The console must have been buzzing for a while before he noticed—Liara is frowning and short-tempered when he picks up.

“She's here, Garrus. She's heading here.”

“What?”

“I couldn't decrypt the pinged message to anything legible, but she sent _me_ a message a few minutes ago. She's chartered a shuttle to Osun and contacted me for a pickup.”

“Did she say why?”

“No.”

Walking to the cockpit feels like a beggar's crawl, every step dragging behind him.

“Jack was right,” he admits, reluctant, dropping into the copilot chair. “She's going to Liara.”

“So I guess that's our destination, too.”

 _Sorry_ gets stuck in his throat, so he slinks back down to the battery.

Without a shuttle, Joker has to take them all the way to Hagalaz.

“I've disabled the telemetry system,” Miranda tells him. “EDI will record us no further than the relay. It'll look like a resource run to Ploitari.”

They're a week behind when Liara sends a shuttle up.

“I'm not sitting this one out,” Joker says, shouldering Garrus aside as roughly as he can manage. Liara meets them in the hangar, frantic, wringing her hands.

“It's been _three_ days like this. She won't eat—she doesn't sleep. She refuses to leave the room. She wouldn't tell me what happened or where she went, just demanded everything I had on Project Lazarus and shut herself up inside.”

The ship looks lived-in now, main deck swept clean of the old Broker's ashes, neatly-ordered kiosks set into the rails. Liara points up the stairs and collapses beside Feron, onto an oddly luxurious couch shoved beneath the only window.

“I don't know what to do. She keeps saying she's waiting, but I don't know what that means.”

Joker takes the initiative, pulling himself up the steps and knocking on the door.

“C'mon, Commander. I can hear you moving around in there.”

The door slides open, only halfway, and Garrus catches a brief glimpse of her sunken face.

“You're not who I'm waiting for,” she says simply, and closes and locks the door.

“What the fuck is _that_ supposed to mean?”

“That she's waiting for someone,” Feron drawls. “And it's not any of you.”

“This is ridiculous,” Garrus says, hammering at the door with his closed fist. “Shepard, come out! We want to help you!”

“Whether you want us to or not,” Joker says shortly, joining Tali and Liara on the couch. “Just leave her alone, already!”

The racket just serves to give them all headaches, and Garrus stalks back down to the main floor.

“Who is she waiting for?”

“She wouldn't say,” Feron replies, removed enough from the situation to deflect any anger. “I'm guessing whoever it is will arrive soon enough.”

And he has impeccable timing. Within an hour, the ship has picked up an intermittent signal, and Liara sets the infodrone to enhance it.

“Hello? Shepard, are you there? Is _anyone_ there? This is Commander Alenko of the Alliance Navy. If anyone is receiving, please respond.”

Feron guides him through the storm, and they all gather to meet him as he climbs out of his shuttle, dirty and tired from the travel.

“I must've been flying around out there for hours,” he says. “Should've asked her to be more specific.”

Liara smiles tentatively, reaching to touch his shoulder.

“It's been a long time,” she says. “How are you?”

“How is _she_? Wouldn't connect for visual, wouldn't tell me where she was or what was happening.”

Kaidan's gaze flickers briefly across Garrus, to Tali and Joker and Feron.

“You should go up,” Joker says quietly. “She's waiting for you.”


	12. Eleven

** Eleven **

The Shadow Broker's ship looks massive from the outside, but it's really no more than five rooms and a hangar, connected by twisted corridors and barely-passable ventilation shafts. She marks each entrance and exit, valves, junctions, maps every rectangle of grate and meter of cable, from source to terminus. She uses scrap from the hangar floor to create the model, molding wires and glue between steady fingers.

“An accurate representation,” the infodrone says, and it's right—this is only a facsimile, exact in scale, perfect, but only that: imitation.

The real ship, the enfolding twist of metal and energy that encompasses her, is suffocating. After one day of watching Feron sift through the files with a series of search protocols that seem to grow progressively less efficient, Shepard tells him to leave and closes the door behind him. Liara makes a fuss of the imposition.

“You sold my body to the highest bidder,” Shepard tells her. “You didn't care if it was what _I_ wanted, because it was what _you_ wanted. You owe me this.”

“That was not my decision—”

“No, it wasn't,” Shepard says, and closes the door once again.

Writing out new protocol and algorithms for the search program takes her six hours, six wonderful hours of concentration, of code and line and pattern. Outside the door, she can hear scuttling, swearing, the quiet brush of insistent hands against the seam. The overly-sweet smell of asari food squirms beneath the door and into the room, so she piles blankets and boxes around, isolating, making a cocoon to nestle and wait. And while the vids render, she builds.

The SR-2, in all its sinister glory, four whole wings where two-and-a-half had done just fine, twin dorsal blades, belly bloated with so much extra space. Then Sovereign, a mass of tentacles and unsettling smooth lines. Then an Alliance cruiser, like the _Copenhagen_ , each cramped deck overflowing with thoughtless crew, the worst place for a little girl to run off and play alone. A turian cruiser, a few common freighters, a geth drop-ship, the _Destiny Ascension_.

No notes, no diagrams. No cheating. Just memory. She holds each completed model out to the infodrone, the only voice she can stand to hear.

“A perfect likeness,” it says. Or, “Excellent work, Shadow Broker. Shall I add this to your collection?”

And it lines them up for her, arranges each ship on the table, beside the trays of food it brings. She has no desire to eat. In the background, vids finish rendering one-by-one and then play automatically.

_“We've brought a few systems back online, but they won't last without artificial support.”_

_“Jesus, Miranda, you make her sound like a machine.”_

She never sees Wilson's face—he is the camera, ocular implants, each blink separating surveillance like scenes in a poorly-shot drama. The scenes shift and snap closed, jumping from day one to seventy-three to four-hundred-fifty-five.

 _“Biological reconstruction alone in untenable. We would be better served by implementing cybernetics. We don't need_ all _of Shepard.”_

Recording the QEC creates some kind of distortion: she never sees the Illusive Man, either, just a calmly smoking blur.

 _“Go ahead, Wilson,”_ Miranda says with a quick coolness. _“It was your find, after all.”_

_“I noticed an anomaly in Shepard's vitals. We've brought her digestive system back to full functionality, so I've been monitoring her nutrient intake. There's been an unexpected spike.”_

_“Meaning?”_

_“She's taking in more than I calculated.”_

_“So she has a healthy appetite. Hardly worth calling me.”_

_“No, sir, you misunderstand. Shepard's taking in more nutrients because she needs them. She's...sir, she's pregnant.”_

Shepard glues two of her fingers together and holds them out for the infodrone to blast with ultrasonic waves, watching as she waits.

_“I expected Wilson to keep me appraised of any new developments while I focused my efforts on neurological reconstruction.”_

_“I_ did _tell you, Miranda, as soon as I discovered it. The reproductive system was tertiary.”_

_“And therefore unmonitored?”_

Miranda turns to the Illusive blur.

_“My recommendation is that we terminate, immediately. I've estimated gestational age at around eight weeks.”_

_“We can't do that!”_ Wilson says quickly, and blinks.

 _“The procedure is perfectly within our abilities,”_ Miranda says icily. Wilson glances to the Illusive Man again.

 _“We have no way of knowing how far along she was when she died. She might've known about the pregnancy. She might have_ wanted _the pregnancy. You said to bring her back exactly as she was.”_

_“She just as easily might have not known. And considering what exposure did to the body, the embryo might be malformed and nonviable.”_

_“In which case she's likely to spontaneously miscarry! There'd be no need for our intervention.”_

_“Wilson, if we had intended to simply let nature take its course, we would be sending Shepard back to the Alliance in a box.”_

Shepard doesn't care to see how Wilson wins the argument, muting the audio and shaking out her newly-separated fingers. She runs both hands down her flat stomach, pressing in, feeling the slight dip between every muscle. Her clothes feel heavy and stiff, unclean, the same outfit she'd first arrived in. She forgot to send Rala'Tor a forwarding address.

So she sets a lock on the door and strips down. There's something like a bathroom towards the back—a toilet, a shallow sink, and a spout sticking out of the wall two meters from the floor. The infodrone follows, dodging the spray of water.

“Your clothing will be cleaned, Shadow Broker, and returned in approximately one hour. Will there be anything else?”

It understands the slow shake of her head, seizing her clothes and disappearing into a tunnel she'd mistaken for ventilation. The food that managed to sneak through her fortifications is stale now, but she stands at the table and nibbles, inspecting her miniature fleet. Alone, she should feel free, safe, content, but the lack of eyes, so familiar, so expected, somehow unnerves her.

She will be her own surveillance, then: a piece of warped glass, illuminated, throws back her murky reflection. She sets up a projection of Lazarus scans and compares, conducting a careful search, starting at her fingertips.

All the old seams have pressed together—no longer is her skin spider-webbed in ugly orange, smooth and unbroken from wrists to shoulders, down to her hips, down further to her knees and ankles. She wiggles each toe individually, from outside left to outside right, bends each finger. The pattern of freckles is near-familiar, dense on her torso and diffusing across each joint, a few darker spots in the crease of her right thigh and in the unreachable center of her back.

She presses a fingernail into the flesh at her hip. She feels softer there, thicker than she remembers, an unaccounted roundness. The search calls up an image for her, _of_ her, middle swelling gently beneath the ultrasound wand, Wilson's hand sweeping back and forth. He's facing away from the monitor, so all she can see is herself, empty face, tubes and meat in a silent envelope of skin.

The water has just finished beading out of her hair when the infodrone returns. Her clothes smell metallic but clean, and she slides back into them gratefully, just in time, as there's a quiet knocking at the door.

“C'mon, Commander. I can hear you moving around in there.”

Someone's calling her home, but it's not the right voice. She sets the door to slide only halfway, frowning at Joker's worried face.

“You're not who I'm waiting for.”

Garrus's fury answers the lock, unexpected, pushing her back behind the table.

“Shepard, come out!”

Even the echo echoes, shattering, reforming, scattering the oxygen, too far to breath in. Shepard sinks into the corner, expecting at any moment for her vision to flood green and orange, but the noise ends abruptly, without the necessary scream or gunshot, and she's still on the Broker's ship, still locked away, contained, caged, safe. The echo fades to a murmur, a discontented stream babbling beneath her pulse.

Yes, she is waiting. She should be curious how they found her, but the answer will be obvious if she gives it any thought.

There's a great deal of movement and shuffling outside, then total silence. She presses her ear to the seam and waits. They've left the room, and she counts the receding footsteps: Feron, Liara, Tali, Joker and his crutches, Garrus. They return moments later, all of them plus one.

“Technically, I'm on special assignment for Anderson. Council doesn't know what to do with my Horizon report, let alone the Alliance.”

No flood of warmth, no relief. She forces herself to feel happiness, to remember how hearing his voice _used_ to make her feel. The smile stretches her mouth uncomfortably. There's a creak of shifting leather as someone settles back onto the couch.

“She's upstairs,” Garrus says. “Listen, Kaidan—”

The name falls out of his mouth, brusque and cold and business.

“I know you're upset with her, but go easy. She's been through a lot in the last few days.”

“See if you can get her to eat something,” Tali says. “Or sleep.”

Coddling, assuming, pretending they know anything she doesn't know herself. She stands and slams open the lock, fake smile crushed by fury.

“I'll sleep when I'm dead,” she says, momentum carrying her as far as the top of the stairs. Kaidan meets her eyes briefly, then sweeps quickly over her body.

She has to think of what he sees, what he last saw on Horizon: full armor, quiet humor, inappropriate affect for reuniting with one's long-lost lover. But then she remembers what she saw, what she felt: Miranda's eyes on her back, and the Illusive Man's eyes behind hers. The moment their hands met—that's when it all started to fall apart.

Pale, she thinks, face probably thinner than on Horizon, eyes pooled in deep hollows, mouth set in a tight frown. He's not much better, come to think of it: stubble thick, hair going grey at his temples, tired lines etched around every feature.

She has no idea what to say, but he saves her.

“Hey, Shepard. I guess we should talk.”

“Yeah,” she says, breathless, and stands aside to let him pass. He hides any disgust at the state of the room, crossing to the far side and waiting to speak again until she's closed the door.

“Well, it worked. You've scared me,” Kaidan says, “and here I am. What's this about?”

She doesn't answer at first, silenced by a nervous energy that keeps her moving, rubbing her hands over and over each other.

“I don't know how to start,” she says, taking a half-step forward and faltering when he leans away. “I'm sorry. I didn't really think—I thought that it would be different when you got here, when you were standing in front of me. I'd just know what to say, how to explain—”

She makes a frustrated sound and spins away, pacing to the far wall and back.

“Shepard—”

“I'm sorry,” she says again. “I'm sorry. I don't know what to say.”

Her hands fall uselessly to her sides, twisting into the hem of her jacket, and he unfolds from the wall, pulled by guilt to reach out.

“It's alright,” he says. “We have time.”

Shepard's fist barely chokes the involuntary bark of laughter.

“Of course,” she agrees. “Of course, we have time.”

It's not exactly an invitation to join, but she drops onto a chair at the table and clears off its partner, and he sits hesitantly. He's patient, but only to a point, clearing his throat and speaking quietly after a long silence.

“In your message, the first one you sent, after...after Horizon, you mentioned Toombs.”

“I mentioned a lot of things. You thought I was drunk, right? That's why you didn't answer.”

“Well, in all fairness, _I_ was a little drunk when I sent mine.”

And now he's smiling, still gentle, curled hand inches from hers on the tabletop, nudging closer, and she pulls both hands out of range, pushing them into her eyes.

“I wasn't drunk. I'd just found out that I gave birth to a child that Cerberus took and never told me about.”

She sees only an explosion of white and red behind her eyelids, a visual representation of the force she exerts. Kaidan has gone absolutely still—she can't even hear him breathing.

“They were never going to tell me. Not unless it became necessary. One of my crew found the surveillance vid and gave it to me, as a kind of—I don't know. A thank-you. She's not very good at having friends.”

Her voice is clinical now, distant, speaking of abstracts.

“It probably happened on Intai'sei. Just a random accident. I didn't know, before I died. Cerberus bet on that possibility, and they were right.”

Looks up at last, into Kaidan's horrified, wet, black eyes. All of it, the vids and the still holos and the pages of internal memos and private logs and personal messages, all surrounding her, pressing them together beneath its weight. She shoves off from the table, setting her fleet of miniatures spinning.

“It was a boy. The baby. _Is_ a boy. I don't know where he is or what they did with him.”

She pulls a datapad from its place at the bottom of the stack and holds it out to him with unsteady hands.

“You can watch. I don't care.”


	13. Twelve

** Twelve **

Kaidan emerges from the room less than an hour after entering, hand over his mouth, eyes unfocused.

Tali speaks first, and Garrus resumes his pacing, assured that the others will deal with him.

“Are you alright?

“She...she left. Said she didn't want to see it again. Didn't tell me where she was going.”

“She didn't come through here,” Liara says gently.

“Probably took the back tunnels to the engine room,” Feron says. “It's the only place on this ship you can get away from the drone.”

Kaidan nods, stopping midway down the stairs, leaning unsteadily on the rail. They'd all gathered on the couches to wait out the meeting, except Garrus, who cannot abide such stillness.

“You've all seen it?”

“Yeah,” Joker says quietly. Kaidan nods again, slowly, twisting one hand around the opposite wrist. Joker leans forward, elbows balanced on his knees.

His view of the vignette is blocked by part of a column, so Garrus moves closer, tightening the circle of his boots across the floor. Kaidan continues thinking out loud, either from affection for his own voice or a distinct inability to figure anything out by himself.

“I met that woman. Miranda. On Horizon.”

“She's up on the _Normandy_ right now. Kinda makes you want to take a shuttle up and break her neck, huh?”

Kaidan doesn't nod at this, doesn't return Joker's half-smile, just stares. Garrus makes an unquiet noise of derision—he can see the slow cogs of Kaidan's mind working behind his eyes as his hands close over his face, muffling his voice.

“I just don't...god, how did this happen?”

“Well,” Joker says lightly, “sometimes, when a man and a woman love each other very much...”

“Yeah, I'm clear on the _mechanics_.”

It sounds unduly harsh to Garrus, but Joker chuckles, and Kaidan uncoils from the rail, turning to Tali.

“Is this worse than when you came to see us?”

“We went to see _Anderson_ ,” Garrus mutters, earning a quick series of disapproving looks from the gallery and Kaidan's never-readable stare.

“Y-yes, it's worse,” Tali says, and Kaidan's stare slides back to her. “After she told us, I thought maybe everything would go back to—”

She laughs shortly.

“Back to _normal_ , whatever that is. We wanted so badly to help, but we had no idea what to do. I think we just made it worse.”

“You did what you could,” Kaidan says, almost simpering, so _fucking_ condescending. Everyone nods, accepting his judgment. “Jane's a private person. She doesn't like asking for help.”

“Then she probably won't want yours,” Garrus says, mandibles clicking around each irritated syllable.

“I really don't think that level of hostility is necessary,” Joker says carefully.

“She asked me to come here.”

“And it was so nice of you to make time in your _busy_ schedule.”

He telegraphs aggression in every movement, muscles working beneath that far-too-thin skin, those wide-set and inexpressive eyes blinking once.

“Garrus, if you have something to say, just say it.”

Garrus rolls his eyes—learned from Shepard, an expression of muscles she said humans use to indicate annoyance or disbelief. It's unsubtle, but he's interested more in the reaction than the message.

“Maybe you should get drunk first. Isn't that usually how you handle these things?”

Kaidan frowns, a sharp narrowing of his features, and behind him Joker jumps up.

“Okay, yeah, _way_ more hostile than necessary.”

“Let him fight his own battles,” Garrus snarls. “He never needed your help. Or don't you remember?”

He whips his gaze over to the rest.

“Don't _any_ of you remember?”

Their silence is complicity, and he growls.

“Garrus...”

Tali half-rises from the couch, arm stretched in warning.

“What? _Don't_? What's wrong with you? How can you just let him back _in_ like this?”

He knows her answer already and shoulders it aside, prowling back and forth. Kaidan remains motionless, playing half-dead, as though it could protect him.

“Your issue is with me,” Kaidan says quietly. “Leave them out of it.”

“Because it's always about _you_ , isn't it? So saintly and self-obsessed—two years ago you didn't give a shit about _any_ of them, but here you are now—”

“Is that what this is about?”

Kaidan huffs, arms crossing.

“You're one to talk about self-obsession, you know? I came out here _because she asked_. I didn't know any of you would be here—”

“Probably wouldn't have come if you did.”

“Garrus,” Tali says sharply. “What is this getting you?”

That look on Kaidan's face, for one.

“You traitorous piece of shit,” Garrus says. “You spit on loyalty, you turned your back on her, but now you come slithering back into our lives like all's forgiven!”

“You can back away right now,” Kaidan says, tone quiet and controlled—absolutely the wrong thing to say. Garrus crosses the floor in four steps, happy to be in range of Kaidan's clenching fists. A thin aura of blue flares from his fingertips, the second warning Garrus doesn't heed.

“Ready for another beating already? I won't be as nice as last time.”

“Last time was a little different. I'm sober now. It's not fair for you.”

There is no one else, nothing else in this room. Kaidan exhales—Garrus inhales.

“Back _away_.”

“Or what? Your threats are _nothing_. And so are you. Care more about that uniform, those stupid fucking stripes, than you ever did about her.”

“You really want to do this, Garrus?”

“You don't? I'll let you make the first move. Tell me you're not interested in a rematch.”

“Not really,” Kaidan says with a cruel twist of his lips. “I already won where it counts.”

Kaidan makes a liar of him—his talons curl into his palm and Garrus swings, vision flooding a furious white. He hits only air.

  


  
**Art by[spacealtie](http://spacealtie.tumblr.com)**  


“Get off me!” he roars, struggling against the resisting pressure, the sudden intrusion between him and his target: Joker, one hand shoving down Garrus's arm, the other holding back Kaidan's curled fist.

“Hey, knock it off!” he yells, shoving them apart. “This really work out that well for you last time?”

Kaidan, breathing hard, relaxes instantly, and the rest of the room reforms around them: Feron, pistol drawn, pulling Liara behind him, and Tali standing, crossing the room on quick feet.

“Shadow Broker, are you in need of assistance?” the infodrone asks.

“Out!” Tali says, grabbing Garrus's shoulder, pulling with a sudden, surprising strength. “Right _now_. We're going!”

Blood still dances through his skull, and the instinct to rip and tear and claw would be just as satisfied with her as with Kaidan, but he allows himself to be removed, to be yanked down the hall to what was once Feron's cell. She slams her fist into the console, locking it, sending up a shower of sparks.

“I don't know what the hell you think you're doing, but you need to stop, right _now_.”

“I _need_ to kill him,” Garrus growls. “That fucking coward just swarms in here and takes over like nothing changed—like he's not a traitor himself, bleating on about loyalty. His only loyalty is to _himself_!”

His fist connects with the desktop, warping the metal.

“You need to let this go,” she says.

“How can you hold him so blameless? Was I the only one in that room?”

He roars again, and it only makes him more angry, heat swirling through his limbs like a typhoon. He aims for the glass and cracks it.

“Garrus, you need to stop. You need to calm down.”

“Don't tell me what I need!”

The column this time, a useless support, composed of something so weak it flakes beneath his fists. Blow after blow, gasping for breath, and it's Kaidan he sees between his fingers, face veiled in bright red blood, choking, eyes closed, submitting. And it's not the ship, it's the apartment, glass crunching beneath their rolling bodies, Kaidan too drunk to even bring up a weak barrier, scraping his knuckles raw on Garrus's plates, arms raising over his face, head ducking down, curling in on himself.

Garrus had stopped then, when he saw what he was doing, but not this time—this time he imagines the kill, imagines beating Kaidan until he lies motionless, glassy-eyed, haloed by his own blood. No witnesses, no Liara or Joker butting in, no sudden cry of alarm, no desperately quiet sobs.

The mask protects her, but the tremor in her voice is unmistakable.

“Garrus, _please_.”

The fight drains from him all to quickly, arms falling to his sides, limp.

“Tali, I...spirits, I'm so sorry.”

He reaches out, certain she'll flinch away, but she pushes herself into the circle of his arms, shaking.

His hands are covered in blood again, but this time it's his own, having nearly shredded his knuckles on the grating.

“I'm sorry,” he says again, muffled in the warm fabric of her hood. “I'm sorry.”

“You can't keep going on like this,” Tali says. “ _We_ can't.”

“You're right. I know you're right.”

She leads him to the desk, and he sits, glad to relinquish all responsibility. There's a small medkit in one of her many pockets, and she tends to his wounds, gently working medi-gel between each finger.

“You think of how many times we've done this?”

“Every wound, every world. I was always team medic.”

“I meant, just us. You and me.”

Tali, always there, always at his back, well within reach, a reassuring heat at his side. Her hands—gloves, really, the thin barrier of cloth and servos, press flat against his, fingers automatically falling around each of his wrists.

“No,” he says quietly. “I never considered it.”

“I have,” Tali says, just as quiet, face down-turned. “More than I should, probably. Sometimes I think, there's no one else who could understand this. And there's no one else I'd...I'd want to.”

There's a fierceness in her voice when she speaks again, taking a step back to meet his reluctant eyes.

“You can apologize,” she says. “To him, to everyone else, to me, but there's no starting over. There is _only_ moving on. Understand?”

He can just make out the smooth lines of her face, the slant of her almost ethereal eyes, and he wishes for the first time that he could see her, _really_ see her, in a way no one else ever could. And then, he thinks, looking down at their twined hands, he already has.

“Yes,” he says and pulls her in again, grateful to at least have this.

He's unwilling to release her, even when there's a gentle knock on the closed door.

“Garrus?” Kaidan says cautiously. “Can we talk?”

“I'll be watching,” Tali warns, releasing him, and she makes a point of closing the door, then marching around and facing them through the glass. Kaidan nods, looking at the floor, waiting until she's gone before he speaks.

“I came to apologize.”

Garrus says nothing, curling his hands behind his back, but Kaidan sees the wound and starts.

“Are you alright?”

“Fine,” Garrus bites out, fighting down the irritation. Of course he's all selfless and concerned—stepping forward, hand outstretched. And then Garrus sees him remember, sees the hesitation, hand falling back to his side. “I guess we're not friends like that, anymore.”

“I guess not,” Kaidan says, just as guarded. He keeps the damaged desk between them, folding his arms back across his chest. “I just wanted to say that I'm sorry. I shouldn't have...I shouldn't have said those things to you. That was wrong.”

Garrus sighs. Most of him still buzzes, hovering somewhere between fury and lust, no better than an animal. The desire to smash Kaidan's face isn't dead, just buried alive.

“You know, it would be easier if you were just the villain in this.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Kaidan says with a half-smile.

Garrus turns away and leans against the desk, and Kaidan does as well. He's never been a good turian—truth is easier without eye contact.

“She needs us both,” he says, focusing on Tali, on the cracked glass. “That's how it always was before. You were the left, and I was the right. She needs that again.”

“What do you think they'll do? To keep her?”

“Whatever they have to. They got to you just to prove that they could.”

“They'll use our son.”

Kaidan pauses, and Garrus can feel his twitch through the desk.

“Huh.”

“What?”

“Just weird to hear it,” Kaidan says with a shrug. “I have a son. I'm a father.”

Tali is pacing on the other side, hands behind her back, throwing them quick glances.

“Yeah, I can't imagine.”

“Almost makes me miss my father. He was such an ass.”

Garrus turns with a quizzical look, and Kaidan starts to laugh.

“Never really got along with him,” he says. “I just wish I had someone to talk to. Someone who would understand this.”

“ _That_ ,” Garrus says, “I can imagine.”


	14. Thirteen

** Thirteen **

Shepard catches most of the fight from beneath the stairs. She'd found this passage accidentally, meant for maintenance drones, but she fits, barely, and it runs a twisted path from the hangar to the hull to the engines to her room.

 _Her_ room. The room Tali shoves Garrus away from, the room Kaidan turns to before he's drawn back by Joker's hiss of pain. Kaidan is a mess—she can see the tremble in his profile, hands covering his closed face.

“I'm sorry,” he says. “I'm sorry, I shouldn't have—”

Joker limps himself toward some privacy, and she follows suit, slithering away between the coiled cables, back along the grease-smeared underbelly of the ship. It's not a straight path by any means: she is detained by static recycle in the engine room and so arrives only after her sanctuary has been invaded.

She lays flat, watching through slits in the grate, as Kaidan closes the door and turns to Joker, perched on a clean chair, shirtless, and twisting around to examine a bruise forming on his back.

“You okay?”

“Nah, but I got twenty-three other ribs, right?”

He grins, and Kaidan's mouth twitches a little.

“Hey, it's okay to laugh,” Joker says gently. “Besides, it's probably closer to fifteen. I sneezed yesterday.”

The best he gets is a half-smile.

“All the same, I'm sorry.”

“I'd say _not your fault_ , but I can't remember which side you were standing on.”

“Neither can I,” Kaidan sighs. “I don't know what came over me. It felt like we were...well. Like last time.”

He glances at Joker shamefully.

“I never apologized to you for any of...what happened.”

“Hard to apologize to someone you can't find.”

“Or won't look for.”

“You were drunk, your dad just died, Shepard was gone. It all happened—”

Joker sighs.

“It all happened a long time ago.”

“Doesn't change what I did,” Kaidan says, handing over a med-kit. “How did you know about...about my dad?”

“ _My_ dad. He likes reading the Alliance briefs in every burst. Recognized the name, and told me. It was a few days after, and I remember thinking that maybe it was you.”

“It wasn't.”

“Yeah, well, I know that _now_ ,” Joker says, with a chuckle that fades abruptly. “Killed me a little, you know? Thinking that maybe you'd...hard to imagine at first, then I just kept picturing you on that floor, all fucked up and alone.”

“It never got that bad.”

Joker's useless with the syringe, missing the port by centimeters, so Kaidan takes the needle, overcareful, pressing the plunger with a frown.

“Is this...did Cerberus...?”

“Free employee upgrades,” Joker confirms with a wry grin. “Too expensive and painful and dangerous to reinforce the bone, but they implanted channels to funnel medi-gel and provide some support.”

He winces.

“Between stealing your kid and breaking Shepard, they did a few good deeds.”

Kaidan nods, already miles away.

“I should go apologize.”

“To Garrus? Think that'll do anything?”

“No. But it's the right thing to do.”

“Fucking boy scout,” Joker sighs, shaking his head. “Go on. I got this.”

Kaidan nods again and leaves. Shepard blinks, breathes in, breathes out.

“Hear enough to satisfy your curiosity? Or do you still have questions?”

He doesn't turn but holds out his shirt expectantly, waiting for her move.

“How did you know I was here?”

“I can hear you lurking,” he says. “C'mon, it's cold.”

She slithers out from the shaft, nudging the grate back into place, taking the shirt and holding it low enough to help one of his arms through.

“So, catch the main event? Any comments?”

“What did you mean by _last time_?”

The other arm, and then she's gently stretching the shirt over his head. He quickly settles that awful hat over his flat hair and shrugs.

“ _Last time_ means last time we all saw each other. Remember that story I told? About my flight status getting revoked?”

He scoots over, and she perches on the other half of the chair, pressed against his side, stealing his warmth. Home: she settles an arm around his back, high, avoiding the injury.

“Wasn't the whole story.”

“Color me surprised.”

“You could use some color,” Joker says, surveying her face with a critical eye. “You're like a fucking blank canvas, you know? Dark lines and empty white spaces.”

“Tell me the story, LT.”

“So, this glorious day. I'm told by the brass to stop with my appeals. I'd gone as high as I could, and it was done. No flying. Day before, Garrus got fired. Didn't know it at the time 'cause he was too ashamed to tell us, but he still hung around, and after finding out that Tali and Liara were being kicked off the detail, we met up with him at some shit bar. It was just a bitch session, you know? I was pissed that I lost the one thing I'd worked so fucking hard for, Garrus was pissed he'd fucked up all over again, and Liara and Tali were just along for the ride.”

“Doubt that's how they'd characterize it.”

“Then they can tell their own fucking version.”

“Okay, okay.”

He smiles, and she's compelled to smile back. It almost feels natural.

“Kaidan was acting CO. None of the _Normandy_ survivors had been reassigned yet, because of stupid fucked up protocol over who could debrief us and why and when. All of my appeals had to go to him, and I told that to Garrus, which somehow meant that we should go over to Kaidan's apartment and make him wave a magic fucking wand and fix everything.”

He sighs and leans a little closer, chin centimeters from her shoulder.

“Kaidan's dad had just died. He was getting ready to go home, for the funeral, and that day—that same fucking day, he was called in to Anderson's office for an _unofficial_ chat. The way Anderson tells it, the brass started out sweet and ended with a threat. Said Kaidan would face court-martial if he didn't keep to the company line. I told you they wanted everything you stirred up gone, and Kaidan and Anderson were the last sticklers. You gone, all Kaidan had left was his career. But he's a good guy.”

She nods at his bitter laugh.

“Said he didn't care, wouldn't throw you over for a promotion and a pay bump. Said they could toss him out—he didn't care. And then they threatened the rest of us.”

“Where was Hackett?”

“Ham-strung. Pulling the pieces of the Fifth Fleet back together. Navy answers to the president, answers to Parliament, answers to the billion-upon-terrified-trillion voters. And Parliament didn't want humanity hiding behind the shadow of a nutjob the Council couldn't stand. No offense.”

She smiles at him, and it's real.

“They were going to ship the rest of us to Siberia, you know? Told him he'd still get his promotion because it was great PR, but everyone else was going to the ass-end of Alliance space, given the shit assignments. He couldn't stop me being grounded or Chakwas routed out to Mars. Anderson burned too many bridges to be any help.”

His smile turns sour.

“So that's the scene. Makes sense he'd go out and get a little blasted, right? And then he stumbles home to a break-in, the four of us sitting there, seething, totally oblivious. Words were exchanged, punches thrown, friendships severed.”

“What did he say to you?”

“Nothing,” he says, too quickly. She waits him out, knowing his insatiable desire to fill a void. “Stupid shit. Stuff he didn't mean. Nothing I hadn't thought myself.”

“Like what?”

He gets quieter.

“That it was my fault. That I deserved to lose flight status because I disobeyed a direct order. Said my selfishness, my obsession with saving the ship was the reason...”

He draws in air, chest expanding against her arm.

“The reason you died. He said it was my fault.”

“It wasn't.”

“Yeah, it was.”

“Jeff, it _wasn't_.”

He meets her eyes briefly, nodding but only to quiet her.

“And I guess that's what set Garrus off. Starts screaming about honor and loyalty. Kaidan had no chance. He was too drunk to defend himself, really, just kinda crumpled to the ground and rolled with the blows. Liara had to separate them with a barrier. Kaidan was such a fucking mess. There was blood everywhere.”

She can see it behind his eyes, can see that he's seeing it all over again.

“ _So_ messed up. Just screamed at us to get out, get the fuck away. And we did. And that's the story of the last time any of us saw him.”

“ _Last time_ ,” Shepard repeats. “Long time ago.”

She pulls Joker's free hand onto her lap, thumb running over his knuckles.

“So, are you crazy?”

“Am I?”

“Are you?”

“I don't know.”

“That's bullshit, Commander,” he grins.

She can't meet his eyes, focusing on the seam of their joined fingers as it begins to blur.

“You know what you are. Get it together, Shepard. We need you.”

He leaves her alone after a quick kiss to her temple. Home, she thinks again, fingers tracing where his beard scratched at her skin. As close as she's ever been.

There's time to process now, with the ship gone silent. She anchors herself to the feel of Joker, moments ago against her side. She stays on just half of the seat, unwilling to banish the impression of him. The heat—it crawls beneath her skin, bubbles up between her joints.

“You know what you are.”

She traces the imagined seam—here is what she was, when she was twenty-two. Half-dead, melting into the roof of a Mako, the maw's acid making canyons and craters of her hip and ribcage. Porcelain smooth, leather rough.

Sixteen hours under Akuze's brutal sun, until a turian merchant ship answered the beacon. Then two days in their cargo-hold, screaming, no painkillers, no medi-gel, begging to die. Sometimes she closes her eyes and sees the captain's pitying gaze, feels his cool hand curving over her feverish forehead, hears the calm quiet of his certainty. No one expected her to live.

The room's disorder beckons to her, and she falls onto a pile of blankets. Sleep is something she can summon and control, half-conscious, breathing steady.

She needs to see his face, and his fingers close around hers.

“Corporal Zachary Toombs.”

“Corporal Jane Shepard.”

“It is a genuine pleasure to meet you.”

Forward in time, then back. His message, his threat, the certainty of his gun to her temple—then his funeral, the empty casket and empty words she chokes out, arm splinted at her side, still reforming, still sewing the edges together.

“I'll kill you if I see you,” he promises, but that's not what she remembers, not what she wants to remember. Loving Kaidan is different than loving Zack, more complex. Zack would have loved this body, the smooth lines and softened angles, precise little nails.

She knows what she is: she is Cerberus, she is twenty-two, she is the woman that Zack loved, the woman he fucked and then saved and then left. She is the woman who died on a turian transport, in an Alliance hospital, beside a quiet grave back on Earth. On Ontarom, on Virmire, above Alchera.

She died with David Archer in Atlas Station.

There is a knife curled in her hand, used hours ago to build her models: she opens her eyes and sees it. It feels cool, calming, right. She knows what she is.

The work is slow and simple, a careful carving. She uses her finger as a brush, gently painting medi-gel over her lips. The cut seals, and she scrapes the excess away with what's left of her nails. She leans back and whips her head left and right, the knife-tip catching a pinprick glow from the light above the mirror.

“Perfect,” she says, syllables pulling the skin tight across her mouth. She opens her jaw, stretches every muscle she can feel, scattering the pain through her face. “Perfect.”

She surveys the rest of her body, calling up the holo, checking and rechecking each careful etching. The starburst wound on her kneecap is unsatisfactory, scalpel-like in its precision. She waves an ultrasonic wand over it, releasing a gentle ooze of blood, and examines the wall beside the sink. The metal there is ragged, stitched together with shoddy welding.

Once, twice she tests, swinging her leg back and forth, and then slams her kneecap into the seam. Pain explodes through her leg, pulling the breath from her lungs, and she collapses against the sink, gasping.

Fire is followed by emptiness, stars going supernova behind her eyes as she slides to the floor. She twists her numb legs around, fingers pulling at her thigh to examine her work—but the door behind her opens, and she is frozen in detection.

“Shepard, what was that noise? What happened?”

Kaidan crosses the room in three wide steps, stooping to help her up, but she waves him back, knife still curled in her hand.

“What the hell?” he says, stopping short. “What are you—?”

She's protected momentarily by the lack of light, but she scoots back and pulls herself up the wall, and he's staring at her face, horrified.

“Did you...what are you doing?”

She looks down at the knife and looks up again, mouth open, struggling for the words. She knows how it looks, her face dirty, hair disheveled, clothes speckled with blood.

“I...” she says, barely above a whisper. “I make more sense this way.”

He chokes on something, maybe laughter, finger hovering over the cut that runs down her cheek. She flinches away from the chance of contact, ducking her head, clinging to the wall. Her knee shakes, threatening to fail under her weight, blood soaking her bare feet.

Kaidan follows her around a corner, where she slips down into the darkness between two columns.

“I'm more real like this,” she says, hating the weakness trembling through her voice.

“Jane...”

He kneels and reaches out, gently touching her arms, tugging her hands from her face, sliding a finger across her brow and tucking her hair behind her ear.

“Jane,” he says again, tenderly. “Janie.”

But softness is the opposite of what she wants. He leans in, arms closing around her, but she snaps and lashes out an arm, shoving him back. The knife slices across his chest, just deep enough to draw blood. He gives a strangled cry, knocked on his ass, and his hands fly to his skin.

“What the hell was that for?” he shouts, shoving to his feet. Shepard rises as well, snarling.

“Don't touch me!” she says. “What's wrong with you?”

He doesn't need to be told twice, lifting her by both arms and slamming her against the wall. The impact knocks the knife from her hand, and she claws at him.

“Stop it!” he says. “What the hell are you doing?”

“This is who I am! This is _me_. Can't you remember that?”

He drops her down again but doesn't let go.

“This _isn't_ you. This is what Cerberus did to you.”

“You don't know me,” she snarls. “All of you have this idea, that I'm some big fucking hero and I'll get it together and fix everything and save all your asses, all over again. Well, it's not going to happen!”

The cut on her cheek has reopened, sealed too tight and tearing now, stretching towards her ear.

“And so this is your solution? Just keep cutting until there's nothing left?”

Fuck his lack of blinking—she looks down and speaks to the pulse jumping in his neck.

“If I wanted to die, I'd swallow a gun and end it. This is...this is _me_ , Kaidan. This is what Cerberus took away. I'm just putting it back.”

Her jacket has slipped off one shoulder—the left, exposed down to the elbow, and his grip loosens, hand gliding tentatively over skin that tingles. She shivers at contact, and he makes a small wet sound, tongue ungluing from the top of his mouth, as though about to speak.

She's breathing too fast, face turned left and pressed to the wall, eyes focused on a bubble in the welding, as his fingers move lower, gently pushing the jacket past her wrist and off, gliding back up to her shoulder and down again.

“I remember,” he says, not _this_ , but what was there, she thinks, because he's tracing the perfect line of where all her scars used to be, pressing in, deep enough to bruise.

“Kaidan—”

Not gentle, as he yanks her chin, forces her to look at him, to watch as he leans in and kisses her, brutal, nipping her lower lip until she lets him in. He releases her long enough to wrap his arms around her back and pull her tight against him. There is blood in his mouth—hers or his, but she doesn't care, because _this_ is real, is the most real thing she's felt since waking up on Lazarus Station.

One arm circles his neck, and their hands tangle at his belt and then at her zipper, ripping seams, breaking what won't give way. She locks her legs around his back, pulling him deeper, gasping for air when he finally breaks the kiss.

Nothing sensual or romantic about it, just a fast fuck against the wall that leaves her unsatisfied. Kaidan rests his head on her chest, regaining his breath, and eventually carries her to the bed. He doesn't even pause long enough to tend to her knee, stripping away what's left of their clothes, a line of lips and teeth down between her thighs, but soon enough the blood congeals and she's lying beside him, sated, brushing the sweat-soaked hair from his temple.

“I was lost without you,” he whispers, eyes closing, catching her wrist and holding her hand against his cheek. “I feel like the last two years happened to someone else.”

“Maybe they did.”

“I missed you.”

“I missed you,” she says, with the same little stress on the second word, as though she'd been the one to say it first.


	15. Fourteen

** Fourteen **

Liara shows them to a shuttle in Cerberus colors and waves aside their questions.

“I have others, anyway,” she says. “Just take it.”

The ship is silent, and the crew busy running monthly diagnostics, barely glancing up as they pass. Joker drops delicately into his chair. Garrus and Tali don't speak, entering the elevator, going down together. He's a little surprised that she follows him all the way to the battery, locking the door like it's hers. They barely fit on his cot.

Sleep is more than refreshment. Garrus wakes slowly, calmly, curled around Tali. The ship warms around them, humming gently, lights soft enough to make him think he might still be dreaming.

But he isn't, and Tali is happy to remind him, settling the points of her elbows against his bare chest.

“So,” she says. “How about a plan, this time?”

Miranda, put-off and somewhat astonished at the intrusion, hastily clears a few seats and makes to dismiss Jacob as Garrus and Tali let themselves into her cabin.

“Actually, we need both of you,” Garrus says. “Is this room clear?”

“Yes. Shepard and Solus were thorough.”

“Good. I need to ask a few personal questions.”

They take the offered seats, two chairs across from a couch. Tali sets her pistol on the coffee-table, barrel facing Miranda's knees.

“Hell of a way to start a conversation,” Jacob says defensively, crossing his arms and leaning away.

“That's because it isn't a conversation,” Tali says, falsely sweet.

“I'm sure you knew some version of this was coming,” Garrus says, nodding. “Maybe you thought you'd have a little more time to craft your answers. But I need to know now: when it comes down to a choice between the Illusive Man and Shepard, where will you be?”

“If we say Shepard, you won't believe us,” Jacob snaps, “and if we say the Illusive Man, you'll shoot us.”

“I might,” Garrus admits with a shrug. “I might not. I'm feeling...what should I say? _Magnanimous_?”

“Shepard,” Miranda says quietly, staring at her fingers. “I would choose Shepard.”

She silences Jacob's protest with a look and then turns her unwavering gaze to Garrus.

“I don't expect you to believe me. I hardly believe it myself. My life, since I escaped from my father all those years ago, has been directed by the Illusive Man. By Cerberus. He never gave me any reason to distrust him or to betray him.”

“So why pick Shepard?”

“What I did to her...”

Miranda shakes her head, sighing, standing. Her arm has healed enough for a soft splint, and she's back to the old catsuit, but still hunched, still lacking that ugly confidence.

“I don't ever expect her forgiveness. I wouldn't forgive, if I were her. I thought, once, that what I did was the right thing. I don't believe that anymore.”

“Why not?”

“Because of what she's done for me. And what I did to her. I was told to bring her back exactly the same, but I had no idea who she really was. All we had were official files, news vids, holos...”

Miranda smiles a little sadly.

“No one's ever as simple as their service record. I should have known that. But all I saw was a tool, an opportunity for Cerberus. A project. That's all the Illusive Man sees.”

“What's his plan? After the Collectors.”

Miranda blinks.

“I don't know. I suppose the Reapers.”

“I mean, what's his plan for Shepard?” Garrus says. “What will he do to her?”

“Whatever he feels is necessary,” Miranda says almost immediately. “And only that. He won't waste his time with revenge.”

“What about you?” Garrus asks, rounding on Jacob.

“What, revenge?”

“No, idiot,” Tali says. “Shepard or Cerberus.”

“Shepard.”

“For the same reasons as Miranda?”

Tali earns Jacob's glare for her disdain, but he at least recognizes the balance of power, glancing quickly to the pistol and back up.

“No.”

“Jacob didn't know the full extent of the project,” Miranda says quickly. “He saw Shepard only once, when she was first recovered. He was security detail, nothing more.”

“I was _your_ detail, Miranda,” Jacob says. “I joined Cerberus because of you, because I trusted _you_. I never liked the Illusive Man.”

“But you liked his money,” Garrus says pointedly.

“Yeah, I guess so. I know I'm not the one to talk about loyalty. I left the Alliance behind, and now I'm throwing over Cerberus. But Miranda's right. I can't pretend not to see the shit that Cerberus...that _we_ have done. And not just to Shepard.”

Tali glances at Garrus, and he nods. She picks up her pistol and sets it back in its slot at her hip.

“That's good,” Garrus says, “for now.”

“But not enough, though?” Miranda asks. “And it's not the only reason you came here.”

“No. But it does make this next part easier.”

She nods and rejoins Jacob on the couch, keeping an almost intimate distance between them.

“You said the Illusive Man won't bother with revenge. But four billion's a lot of credits to waste on someone who knifes you in the back, steals your ship and your best operatives. What will he do when we cut loose?”

Miranda considers.

“He may be willing to write Shepard off as a loss, but he'll want the ship back. He's written takeover protocols into EDI's programming, but they're disabled.”

She smiles at his shock.

“How else do you think Shepard managed to get rid of all the surveillance? I altered the programming after—”

She sighs, pulling a face of dissatisfaction.

“After Pragia. And after she saved my sister.”

“Why?”

“I suppose I began to question what I'd done. I'd asked her to help me save my sister from our father, because I didn't want her to be manipulated the way I was. Used, even, as a tool, as a legacy. It made me consider Lazarus in a new light, and question the things I'd done. The things we were all still doing, every little report, every inquiry. The secrecy of it.”

“You gave Jack the vid,” Tali says with surprise.

“More or less. I didn't prevent her from accessing the Lazarus files. But I didn't expect all this. I...I don't know what I expected.”

Miranda rubs at her brow with her good hand.

“No matter now. She knows, as she always should have.”

“What will the Illusive Man do to her child?” Tali asks hesitantly.

“I don't know. The child was an anomaly. I don't know what possessed the Illusive Man to listen to Wilson and preserve him, but at the time, I imagined he would prove a decent bit of blackmail. He refused my idea of a control chip, but he knew we would need collateral should Shepard prove uncooperative. To that end—”

Jacob rises at her gesture and grabs a stack of datapads, handing them across the table to Garrus and Tali.

“I've been compiling information, these last few weeks,” she continues, syncing the datapads to her omnitool and opening the files for them. “All of this is still Lazarus, and as director of said project, I'm entitled to updates on all aspects of the project. Including Subject Beta.”

She calls up a holo: a human infant with a crown of dark hair, face blurred by motion.

“They named him _Michael_ ,” Miranda says contemptuously. “He's nearly five months old.”

It's not exactly a portrait, but the couple holding him seem aware of the surveillance. They're standing outside some prefab shack, attempting to blend with the slight crowd.

“That man, in the holo,” Tali says. “He was in the vid. He delivered the child.”

“Mikael Solheim. A talented physician we brought in to help with organ reconstruction. He'd had more training in obstetrics than anyone else on the station. Narcissistic. Unwaveringly loyal.”

“And the woman?” Garrus asks.

“No one I recognize, but definitely Cerberus. She'll be as dedicated to the cause as Mikael.”

“Do you know where they are?”

“Yes,” Miranda says and opens a miniature galaxy map. “They've infiltrated Benning as a humble merchant and his family. It's a fairly well-established human colony in the Arcturus Stream. Not a Cerberus front, but scattered with enough agents to provide protection when necessary.”

“And outside the Collectors' area of interest.”

“Yes.”

“How well-defended?”

“More than you'd like,” Miranda says with a frown. “Surrounded by civilians, but nothing a small squad couldn't handle, if the Illusive Man doesn't know that they're coming.”

“But he'd notice us,” Tali says. “And then they'll disappear.”

“For now, the Illusive Man doesn't know that Shepard is aware of her child's existence. But as soon as a move is made...”

“So we need to watch our timing,” Garrus muses, glancing at Tali.

“Kaidan could do it,” she says.

“Not alone,” he replies. “And not without attracting attention.”

“The best chance to strike will come when the Illusive Man's distracted,” Jacob says. “And nothing's more distracting than a suicide mission.”

“We jump through the relay, and Kaidan goes after his son.”

“Go to ground here, with Liara.”

Garrus nods, considering.

“And supposing Shepard makes it through, she meets back up with him, and then what?”

“Go into hiding,” Miranda says. “Hand the _Normandy_ over to the Alliance, and disappear.”

“She wouldn't do that,” Jacob says, shaking his head. “Not with the Reapers still out there. Shepard's a fighter.”

“I wouldn't be so certain about that,” Garrus says quietly. “But, supposing she did go in to hiding, with Kaidan and the child. What else would the Illusive Man use to keep her?”

“It's not...inconceivable that the Illusive Man would target Shepard's family. Her parents.”

“He was fine with using Kaidan against her.”

“Does he know?” Miranda asks delicately.

“He's on the Broker ship now. Probably best you don't go down.”

Miranda nods, head in her hands. Jacob reaches for her shoulder but stops, noticing Garrus's stare. Garrus looks away, to Tali, who is busy plotting something on the galaxy map. He wants to say that he understands, the way something—some _one_ like that sneaks in, when least expected, when least known or needed. Miranda remains miserably oblivious.

“We still have the problem of the IFF,” she says. “The longer we wait, the less likely there will be anything to retrieve.”

“I agree,” Tali says with a nod. “The four of us could probably do it, but this _is_ Shepard's fight. And she needs to get back in it.”

“We'll go down and check on her—on them, in a bit. But I want to go down with a plan.”

They leave Miranda and Jacob to work out the details.

“Let them feel they've contributed,” Tali says bitterly, on the ride up to the CIC. “You don't really believe them, do you?”

“I might,” Garrus says. “What's Shepard's phrase? When you can count the people you trust on one hand...”

Tali waves her three digits with a laugh.

“Not such an easy translation.”

Joker's grumbling through a diagnostic, hardly sparing them a glance.

“EDI, I was gone for less than one day. You don't get to just swoop in and fuck with my settings like I'm dead and never coming back.”

“None of your settings were changed, Mr. Moreau. Perhaps your recent injury has caused agitation and memory lapse.”

“Yeah, okay, _sorry_ ,” he sighs, directing a portion of his attention to Garrus and Tali. “How'd it go with the wonder twins?”

“Ready to beg their way back into our good graces,” Tali scoffs, sliding into the copilot chair. “But they brought decent information.”

“And how's the left hand?”

“I think they could use some privacy,” she says, before Garrus can speak. “We can call down later.”

She hands over a datapad with the holo of Shepard's son.

“Jesus, what a cutie,” Joker says flatly. “The fuck are they doing to him?”

“Nothing, yet. Just holding on to him until they're given orders.”

“We know where he is?”

“Plan's being worked out,” Garrus says shortly. “And it doesn't need any more conspirators.”

Tali conveys her disappointment with a sharp turn of her head.

“You don't have to make him apologize,” Joker laughs. “He's a big boy. He'll get around to it.”

“Not with that attitude,” Tali sighs.

The day comes full circle as she ushers Garrus back to the battery and settles herself back onto his cot. Miranda has delivered a stack of OSDs—more information about Solheim, about Benning, about Shepard.

“Hannah Shepard vas _Orizaba_ and George Shepard vas _Copenhagen_ ,” Tali reads, and he can imagine the face that goes with her bemusement. “Human names are so _odd_.”

“I'm sure they think the same thing about quarian names.”

Tali has already moved on, reexamining the holo.

“He looks like Kaidan. Don't you think?”

“They all look alike,” he says shortly. “We should focus on the mission.”

He can read the challenge in her pose, but she says nothing, setting aside the holo.

“One plan went well. Try for another?”

“Probably shouldn't press our luck,” he says quietly, turning away from her. Tali is silent for a while, letting him work the console without interruption.

“Eventually, you'll have to take a chance on something, Garrus.”

“Eventually,” he agrees, and climbs down into the guns, “but not right now.”


	16. Fifteen

** Fifteen **

Shepard curls against Kaidan and wills sleep into her unresponsive limbs, matching her inhale and exhale to his. Sleep settles across his features, smoothing the lines gathered around his eyes, untwisting the frown from his lips, flattening out his furrowed brow. Wherever he's gone is far away—she plants a series of small kisses along his jaw, but he doesn't stir.

Part of her is still scared, but there is safety in this, in the familiar heavy curves of Kaidan's body beneath her. So she lets go.

Corporal Toombs stands near the door, eyes downcast, relieved of his weapon. Ontarom, where she's ordered Garrus and Kaidan to stand guard over Dr. Wayne, where they're waiting for a Fifth Fleet pick-up. This is where it starts: he looks up, making it only as far as her hands, and then back down again, speaking to the floor.

“Little baby Jane. All grown up, commission, command, N-school. Almost like you'd planned it.”

And here's where it should end, because she says nothing in reply, can't think, can't do more than stare at her own hands, can barely remember to breathe until Kaidan touches her shoulder and guides her back into the Mako. But this time, this dream, _because_ it is a dream, because he'll shoot her on sight if he ever sees her again, she steps forward and looks up and speaks.

“I didn't think about you, Zack,” she says. “After the first few weeks, I put you away. Like closing a book, closing a part of myself. I just kept going. It's what I've always done.”

There's nothing else she needs to say to him, so she opens her eyes. It's only been a few hours, and Kaidan is still asleep beside her. She contents herself with watching him for a moment, tracing the delicate line of dark lashes set against his pale skin.

She could pretend that they are somewhere else, anywhere else—but she doesn't, keeps her eyes open, feels the damp kiss of the ship's heat between her bare shoulders. There's nothing she can do that will wake him, as she's learned from experience, so she easily maneuvers herself beneath his arm. No pretending. She anchors herself with his hand curled against her stomach.

Sleep again, if it wants to come. Another version of Ontarom, where she takes Zack's head between her hands and kisses him until he can't breathe. Where Kaidan's waiting behind the wall, where he fights Garrus over who gets to drive this time.

It's nowhere near as revelatory as she was hoping, and it doesn't keep her under for long.

The heat is becoming too much, and the bedclothes are uncomfortably stiff. She sits up, rolling Kaidan onto his back, and delicately peels the fabric from where it has stuck to her wounded knee. The morning-after smell is never as pleasant as advertised, so she limps to the makeshift shower and twists the knob to cold.

The infodrone's been in and out already—fresh food is waiting on the table, and their clothes have been cleaned and pressed. She covers her hands in soap, wincing at the sting, and scrubs her scalp. The water runs pink for a while, as she gingerly wipes the edges of each tear and cut. The medi-gel has held together in some places, but patchwork is still necessary.

Kaidan wakes himself with coughing and rolls over, seeking her.

“Jane?”

She doesn't say anything, busy drip-drying and struggling with the lid of the medkit.

His voice is rough, muffled briefly by his hand rubbing over his face.

“How long have you been up?”

“Not long.”

He pulls his legs to his chest, rearranging the sheet across his lap—not from modesty, but chill. She can see the goosebumps rising on each arm and smiles.

“Infodrone left us some food, if you're hungry.”

She shakes off water as he watches, eyes hooded, frowning, chin on his knees.

“You seem—”

“Clean?”

“Lucid,” he says quietly.

“I feel better.”

“Hmm.”

A noise of suspicion, so she has to show him, crossing the floor, sliding onto the bed, hands running up his covered shins.

“See? Scabs and everything.”

“So, what,” he scoffs, “we make love and suddenly you're cured?”

She smiles, a little rueful, picking at the blanket.

“Isn't that how it works?” she asks softly.

“No, Jane, it isn't.”

He captures her hands and holds them still between their bodies.

“This isn't _you_.”

She's forgotten how she missed the intensity of him, the way anger sparks from his eyes and tightens his jaw. It's pure instinct to lean forward and kiss him, to match the dips and curves of his lips to hers. And he has no objection, uncoiling, bringing a hand up to tangle her wet hair.

“That doesn’t count as an answer,” he warns, but she pushes him back into the pillows and crawls up his body. The sheet keeps them separate.

“I know, Kaidan,” she whispers, resting her head in the crook of his neck and shoulder. “It's just...this is what I can control.”

She takes his left hand and brings it to her face, pressing his fingers against the sealed cut. He pulls back, lightening the pressure, leaving a kiss on her forehead. Their bodies twine around each other as he shifts, rolling against her side, cradling her head between his hands.

“Talk to me, Jane.”

“You know me,” she says quietly, focusing her gaze on his lips.

“I do,” he agrees. “You don't talk. You don't process. You bottle everything up and never ask for help.”

He massages each temple with his thumbs, and she sighs, breathing him out and in.

“Forget everything else. The galaxy. Liara, Joker, Tali, Garrus. Forget the baby. Talk to me about _you_.”

“You can't just separate it like that,” she says, and her face is tight and hot. “All of those things _are_ me, are _part_ of me, and I can't—”

Can't hold it in anymore. Every sob punches its way out of her chest, twists through her throat and chokes her. Kaidan follows her tears with soft, fluttery kisses across her face, enveloping her with his body. The sheet drifts down until they are skin-to-skin, and she draws him as close as she can, tightening her arms around his back.

He knows her—doesn't bother with lies, doesn't shush her, doesn't pretend to reassure her that everything will be okay. He _knows_ her, and waits, holds her close and steady.

“I can't fight him,” she says through painful gasps. “He knew you were on Horizon. He told the Collectors, to draw them there—to draw _me_ there. How can I fight that? He knows my weaknesses, Kaidan. He knows how to hurt me, how to scare me.”

It's almost more contact than she can handle at the moment, so she keeps her eyes closed and works to calm her breathing.

“What do you mean, this is what you can control?” he asks quietly. “That's what you said, isn't it?”

Most of his weight rests on his elbows—she can feel the strain in his shoulders and pulls him tighter against her, waiting for the crush of his collapse. But he pushes back, shifting, sitting up, and she's pulled along, limp, looping his neck in the circle of her arms. Head resting on his shoulder, she sighs and settles into him.

“Jane.”

“I...I felt— _feel_ —like this whole time, I've been following Cerberus's plan, in Cerberus's ship, in Cerberus's body. Nothing about me felt real, felt like me, like the me that fought and died. Everything's so grey and...out-of-focus. So distant.”

She speaks quietly, into his skin.

“At first it was okay, because I didn't want to think. They said _two years_ and I couldn't find any of you, and then he handed me a gun and gave me a mission and I just thought...okay. I thought _okay_ and _this is familiar_ and _I guess this is what I should be doing_. And then all these little cracks appeared, all these little holes and missteps and suddenly I was looking at myself and I realized...”

He strokes her hair slowly, almost reverently.

“I'm going to blame you,” she says with an abrupt, nervous little laugh.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. No one questioned me, until you. Not Tali, not Joker, not Chakwas. Never Garrus. They were just so happy to see me, so eager to be a part of something...maybe it gave them purpose. Not saying I'm the center of the universe or anything.”

“But I wasn't like that.”

“No,” she agrees. “You were angry with me. I wasn't expecting that.”

“What were you expecting?”

“Something similar to last night.”

Kaidan chuckles, sending a gentle rumble through her limbs.

“It wasn't just _you_ , though,” she says. “I'd been feeling disconnected for awhile, but I couldn't even explain it to myself. But what you said, about being manipulated—I knew the Collectors were real, the threat was real, the Council's inaction was _real_ , but...these people murdered my squad, my friends—fuck, I helped you carry Kahoku's body out of that lab on Binthu, and there I was, wearing their colors, taking their money and pretending everything was okay. And then there was Toombs.”

Tears threaten but don't surface, supplanted by a painful tightness in her chest. She presses her face deeper against Kaidan's neck for a moment.

“You mentioned a message from him,” he says haltingly.

“He's going to kill me. Bullet in my head, he ever sees me again. Because I'm working for Cerberus.”

She can hear her voice go suddenly cold, empty.

“He died for me, and this is how I repay him. Probably what I deserve.”

“That's _not_ true,” Kaidan says firmly. “If he still loved you, he'd forgive you.”

“Because you love me, and you _forgive_ me.”

“Maybe not the right word,” he concedes, kissing her hair.

“Maybe not. Somewhere in there, Jack showed me the vid, showed me—”

Can't say it—she's said it too many times, like talking down a ticking clock.

“And I could see that it was me, my body, but I couldn't remember and I thought—how could a person _not remember_ something like that? I wanted it to be someone else, a lie—even if I was someone else, a clone or a VI or something, maybe that would explain...”

She gestures vaguely with one hand, encompassing with a flutter the disorder of the room.

“I was looking. Wanted to see where...maybe where I'd gone.”

“And what did you find?”

“A shell.”

Kaidan laughs.

“I don't remember you being this dramatic. Part of the upgrades?”

“Don't joke about that.”

He runs a comforting hand to her shoulder and squeezes.

“I'm sorry.”

She's not angry enough to push him away, but she knows he can feel it. His response is a slow massage, working his fingers against every little knot and point of tension.

“Jane,” he says again, drawing her back in, “what happened on Aite?”

A shattering—the name alone constricts her heart.

“Hey, stay with me,” Kaidan says urgently. “Jane, stay here.”

His arms tighten, just enough to keep her anchored, to keep her calm.

“He was _inside_ me,” she says. “This hybrid VI—David Archer, this boy that Cerberus tortured and twisted—he took me over.”

“They told me a little,” Kaidan says, nodding. “It was seizing control of electronics, dormant geth and mechs?”

“Not it. _Him_. He was a person. They plugged him into the geth consensus, just to see what would happen. To see how they could use him.”

“Like they used you?”

“He was screaming. We thought it was just feedback, but when I was...I could hear him. I could understand what he was saying, what he wanted. _Quiet, please, make it stop_. Over and over.”

She pushes herself against him, burrowing, digging an oasis between his limbs.

“I had to kill him. To get him out of me, out of my head. Out of my body. I can't explain what it was like—”

“It's okay. You don't have to.”

“You _know_ me,” Shepard says with a slow, warm smile.

“That I do.”

“Better than most.”

She feels the hesitation seize his chest for a moment.

“Better than Garrus?”

“Is that really what you want to talk about right now?”

“You know he's in love with you, Jane.”

She looks down, untangling herself from him, pushing away to the far side of the bed.

“What am I supposed to do about it?” she asks. “Garrus has this idea of me—this bullshit magic hero version of me he made up in his head, and I don't know how to deal with that. I _know_ he loves me. I can't control that.”

Kaidan's too jealous to be reasoned with, huffing, crossing his arms defensively. He hits the scratch by accident and winces.

“I'm sorry,” Shepard says, staring at the cut.

“Not as deep as yours,” he says with a shrug. “I suppose you don't have an explanation for that?”

“Do you remember what I looked like before?”

His gaze follows her hand from hip to elbow.

“I remember you didn't like your scars. The first time we made love, you were embarrassed. Didn't want me to see them.”

“The burns—that was different.”

“Jane, you didn't like _any_ of your scars. You'd spent so much time running from what happened, and you hated seeing the reminder of it.”

“They were _me_ , alright?” she snaps. “No, I didn't really like them, but they were _me_. It was who I was, and Cerberus just wiped it all away.”

She runs a careful finger across the cut on her lips.

“You make more sense this way,” Kaidan sighs.

“Enough to keep it together,” she says, nodding slowly. “Enough to finish this.”

“And then what?”

“I'm not thinking that far ahead.”

“I am.”

He falls back into the pillows, rubbing frustration from his eyes.

“You have to get away from them. From Cerberus.”

“I know that. You have any suggestions?”

“Yeah, actually, we have a plan.”

He's shutting down: she watches the light leave his eyes, the soldier's mask falling across his face. She's not ready to go back just yet and slides back on top of him. He looks up at her warily but accepts the kiss, closing his arms around her back and rolling them over.

She's beginning to understand what two years might have been like—being with him again has made her acutely aware of his previous absence. But he is not her missing piece, her key, her other half—he is just an other, an extra, an extension of her whole, the resolution of a simple equation: one plus one is one, is them, together, entwined.

She feels his eyes on her and opens hers.

“Where are you right now?” he asks, tracing her bottom lip with his thumb.

“Nowhere else,” she says, and almost means it.


	17. Epilogue

** Epilogue **

She pushes her hair behind both ears and walks forward nervously. He doesn't hear her approach, staring at the cables below, leaning over the rail, but he turns when she touches his elbow.

“Hey, Shepard.”

“Shuttle's almost ready. Joker's making his final checks and then we'll be gone. Liara said you were looking for me?”

“Not to say goodbye,” he says. “We don't do that.”

“No,” she says with a little smile. “We don't.”

The tilt of his head invites her to lean beside him, and she does, wrists crossed, following the line of his gaze to his hands and the chain twisted between them.

“I don't have a lot of memories of my dad,” he says, like continuing a story she's heard before, “from when I was a kid. He spent a lot of time on duty, retired when I was a teenager and then, well, I didn't see him for different reasons. But there was one thing I remember perfectly.”

At the end of the chain are his Alliance tags, a little beaten and battle-scarred, and a simple silver ring.

“Whenever he got orders to ship out, he and my mom, they'd do this—I don't know, _ritual_. Every time. He'd take his wedding ring off, put it in her palm, close her fingers over it. Always said the same thing, too, like a promise. _This isn't a gift. Keep it safe for me._ ”

He looks down at his own hands, twisting the ring around.

“He'd come home, she'd give the ring back, and then he'd get more orders and they'd do the whole over again. Every time.”

“Everyone's got their superstitions,” Shepard says quietly, thinking of her own parents.

“When I joined up, he'd already retired. I was at home when my first assignment came up, somewhere off-world, systems away. He was never much for words—my whole life he never told me he loved me. Least, not directly.”

He smiles bitterly.

“Anyway, he came up to me, the night before I left. I was sitting on the porch, just watching the water, and he came and sat down right next to me, took my hand, put his ring in my palm and closed my fingers over it. _This isn't a gift_. Every campaign, every order after that. I'd come home, take the ring off my tags, give it back, and when I left, he'd give it to me again.”

The desire to touch him is incomparable—she has to satisfy herself in resting her arm beside his.

“After he died,” Kaidan continues haltingly, “I kept it with me. It kept me alive, more than anything else after losing you. I wasn't exactly watching my step.”

He looks at her, and she worries a moment about arranging her face, forgetting the proper reaction. But whatever he sees is good enough, as he briefly closes her in the circle of his arms and then steps back.

“So I need you to do something.”

“Anything,” she says, a little breathless.

He takes her left hand, turning her palm upward.

“This isn't a gift. Keep it safe. For me.”


End file.
